UC-NRLF 


EBIES. 


SO  cts, 


FOUNDATIONS. 


ULl^     GAUDARD, 

CTT 


1RAN.-M.A     t_i,    FKt_V, 

I-   F  OURT,  a 


•  '.rAZINE. 


NEW 
NOSTRAXD,  PUBLTSHFTt. 

MUKKAY  AND  27  \VARRFN. STREET. 

1  8  7  K 


J 


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PLACES, 'AND  SrTEAM  BOILERS.    By 

T?      A^nTsrr^rosr^    H  '  V. 

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I       By  J.  J. 

NO.     1U.  HXVJCj  VT     -fl.iVV-/JJLJllKn  XfJ-  i  I\\JF  .   _lii.     »/.   HYDE, 

C.  E.  Illustrated. 

No.  16.—  A  GRAPHIC  METHOD  FOR  SOLVING 
CERTAIN    ALGEBRAICAL    EQUA- 
TIONS.    By  PROP.    GEORGE  L.  VOSE. 

With  Illustrations. 

VAN  NOSTRAND|n_CIENCE  SERIES, 

No.  17.— WATER  AXD  WATER  SUPPLY.  By 
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don. 

No.  19.— STRENGTH  OF  BEAMS  UNDER 
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W.  ALLEN,  Author  of  "Theory  of 
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No.  20.— BRIDGE    AND   TUNNEL    CENTRES. 

By  JOHN  B.  MCMASTERS,  C.   E.     With 

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No.  23.— THE  FATIGUE  OF -METALS  UNDER 
REPEATED  STRAINS,  with  various 
Tables  of  Results  of  Experiments.  From 
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BERG.  With  a  Preface  by  S.  H.  SHRKVE, 
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Mechanical  Engineering.  Illinois  In- 
dustrial University. 

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DWELLING  HOUSES  IN  TOWN 
AND  COUNTRY.  By  GEORGE  E. 
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No.  82. -CABLE  MAKING  FOR  SUSPENSION 
BRIDGES,  as  exemplified  in  the  Con- 
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illustrated. 

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FOU 


DNS. 


TRANSLATED  FROM  THE  FRENCH  BY 

L.  F.  VER\TON  HARCOURT,  M.  A., 

Member  of  Institution  of  Civil  Engineers. 


REPRINTED    FROM    VAN    NOSTBAND'S    MAGAZINE. 


NEW  YORK: 

D.  VAN  NOSTRAND,  PUBLISBER, 
23  MURRAY  AND  27  WARREN  STREET. 

1  878., 


PRE  FACE. 


This  essay,  from  the  pen  of  an  eminent 
continental  engineer,  was  presented,  after 
translation  into  English,  to  the  Institu- 
tion of  Civil  Engineers  of  Great  Britain 
by  L.  F.  Vernon  Harcourt,  M.I.C.E. 

It  was  reprinted  from  the  "Proceed- 
ings" of  the  Institution  in  Van  Nbs- 
trancFs  Magazine,  Vol.  XVIII. 

The  importance  of  the  subject  and 
the  eminence  of  the  author  justify  the 
belief  that,  in  the  compact  form  of  the 
Science  Series,  it  will  be  an  acceptable 
addition  to  engineering  literature. 


F  O  D^Eba^rO  N  S. 


THE  Author  proposes  to  give  a  de. 
scription  of  the  principal  methods 
resorted  to  in  making  foundations.  Al- 
though these  methods  are  applicable,  in 
general,  to  every  sort  of  construction, 
they  possess  a  special  importance  in  the 
case  of  large  bridges,  on  account  of  the 
greatness  of  the  load,  the  instability  of 
the  soil,  and  the  amount  and  flow  of 
water  to  be  contended  with.  It  is  not 
sufficient,  moreover,  that  the  bed  of  the 
river  and  the  ground  upon  which  the 
foundations  of  a  pier  rest  are  firm,  they 
must  also  be  secured  against  scour,  as 
only  harc^ rocks  are  unaffected  by  a  rapid 
stream.  To  ascertain  the  nature  of  the 
soil  on  which  foundations  are  to  be  laid 
borings  are  generally  taken,  but  they 
sometimes  prove  deceptive,  owing  to 


6 

their  coming  on  some  chance  boulders, 
or  upon  some  adhesive  clays  which, 
without  being  firm,  stick  to  the  auger, 
and  twist  it,  or  arrest  its  progress,  and 
the  specimens  brought  up,  being  crushed 
and  pressed  together,  look  firmer  than 
they  really  are.  To  remedy  these  de- 
fects some  engineers  have  adopted  a 
hollow  boring  tool,  down  which  water 
is  pumped  and  reascends,  by  an  annular 
cavity  between  the  exterior  surface  of 
the  tool  and  the  soil,  with  such  velocity 
that  not  only  the  detritus  scraped  off  by 
the  auger,  but  pebbles  also,  are  lifted  by 
it  to  the  surface.  This  process  is  rapid, 
and  the  specimens,  which  are  obtained 
without  torsion,  preserve  their  natural 
consistency. 

On  stiff  clay,  marl,  sand,  or  gravel, 
the  safe  load  is  generally  from  55  to  110 
cwt.  on  the  square  foot,  but  a  load  of 
165  to  183  cwt.  has  been  put  upon  close 
sand  in  the  foundations  of  the  Gorai 
bridge,  and  on  gravel  in  the  Loch  Ken 
viaduct  and  at  Bordeaux.  In  the  bridge 
at  Nantes  there  is  a  load  of  152  cwt.  to 


7 

the  square  foot  on  sand,  but  some  settle- 
ment has  taken  place.  Under  the  cylin- 
drical piers  of  the  Szegedin  bridge  in 
Hungary,  the  soil,  consisting  of  clay  in- 
termixed with  fine  sand,  bears  a  load  of 
133  cwt.  to  the  square  foot;  but  it  was 
deemed  expedient  to  increase  its  sup- 
porting power  by  driving  some  piles  in 
the  interior  of  the  cylinders,  and  also 
to  protect  the  cylinders  by  sheeting  out- 
side. Cylinders,  moreover,  sunk  to  a 
considerable  depth  in  the  ground,  possess 
a  lateral  adherence,  as  is  evident  from 
the  weights  required  for  sinking  them, 
which  adds  greatly  to  the  stability  of 
the  foundations.  Taking  into  account 
this  auxiliary  support,  the  loads  of  159 
and  117  cwt.  per  square  foot,  at  the  bot- 
tom of  the  cylinders  of  the  Charing 
Cross  and  Cannon  Street  bridges  re- 
spectively, are  not  excessive.  On  a  rocky 
ground  the  Roquefavour  aqueduct  ex- 
erts a  pressure  of  268  cwt.  to  the  square 
foot. 

Foundations  may  be  classed  under  two 
heads: — (l)    Ordinary    foundations,    on 


8 

land,  or  protected  from  any  considerable 
rush  of  water;  (2)  Hydraulic  founda- 
tions, in  rivers,  or  in  the  sea. 

ORDINARY   FOUNDATIONS. 

When  the  ground  consists  of  rock, 
hard  marl,  stiff  clay,  or  fine  sand,  the 
foundations  can  be  laid  at  once  on  the 
natural  surface,  or  with  slight  excava- 
tion, and  with  horizontal  steps  where  the 
ground  slopes.  At  the  edge  of  steep 
descents,  with  dipping  strata,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  find  layers  which  will  not  slip, 
or,  if  there  is  such  a  tendency,  to 
strengthen  the  layers  of  rock  by  a  wall, 
especially  when  it  is  liable  to  undergo 
decomposition  by  exposure  to  the  air,  or 
to  use  iron  bolts  uniting  the  layers  of 
rock.  On  ground  having  only  a  super- 
ficial hard  stratum  resting  upon  a  soft 
subsoil,  buildings  have  sometimes  been 
erected  by  merely  increasing  the  bearing 
surface,  and  lightening  the  superstruc- 
ture as  much  as  possible;  but  generally 
it  is  advisable  to  place  the  foundations 
below  all  the  soft  soil.  On  an  uneven 


9 

surface  of  rock  a  layer  of  concrete  spread 
all  over  affords  a  level  foundation. 
Sometimes  large  buildings  have  been 
securely  built  on  quicksands,  of  two 
great  thickness  to  be  excavated,  by  the 
aid  of  excellent  hydraulic  mortar,  and 
by  excavating  separately  the  bed  of  each 
bottom  stone.  Such  a  building  will  be 
stable  if  its  pressure  on  the  foundation 
is  uniform  throughout,  and  if  it  is  placed 
sufficiently  deep  to  counterbalance  the 
tendency  of  the  sand  to  flow  back  into 
the  foundations.  Instances  of  this  class 
of  foundations  are  to  be  found  in  sewers 
built  on  water-bearing  sands,  which 
sometimes  give  rise  to  as  much  difficulty 
as  foundations  built  in  rivers;  as  for  ex- 
ample in  the  net-work  of  London  sewers, 
and  in  the  Metropolitan  railway.  The 
flowing  in  of  sand  with  the  water  in 
pumping,  and  consequent  undermining 
of  the  houses  above,  was  prevented  in 
these  cases  by  constructing  brick  or  iron 
sumps  for  the  pumps  in  suitable  places, 
surrounding  them  by  a  filtering  bed  of 
gravel,  and  using  earthenware  collecting 


10 


pipes,  thus  localising  the  disturbance. 
In  the  construction  of  the  Paris  sewers, 
where  the  water-bearing  strata  could 
not  be  excavated  on  account  of  the  run- 
ning in  of  the  sand,  the  upper  portion 
only  of  the  culvert  was  first  constructed 
(Fig.  1).  A  little  trench  was  then  dug 

Fig,  I. 


SEWERS  IN  PARIS 

out  at  the  bottom,  each  side  being  sup- 
ported by  interlaced  boards,  and  this 
trench  was  then  pumped  dry  in  lengths 
of  about  110  yards  at  a  time.  When 
one  length  was  dry,  a  second  row  of 
boards  was  beaten  down  on  the  top  of 
the  first  row,  and  at  last  it  was  possible 
to  excavate  the  soil  in  lengths  of  thirteen 
feet,  carefully  shored  up,  in  which  the 
lower  portion  and  the  invert  could  be 
constructed,  completing  the  section  of 
the  culvert  (Fig.  2).  In  this  manner  a 


culvert,  nine  feet  ten  fts 
feet  six  inches  high,  ancf* 
was  constructed  in  eighty^Sve  (lays. 
The  excavations  for  a  sewer  at  Grenoble 
were  executed  from  below  upwards,  in 
order  to  insure  a  continuous  flow  of  the 
water,  and  the  sides  were  built  as  the  ex- 
cavation proceeded,  a  trench  supported 
by  boards  conveying  the  water,  and  the 
invert  was  begun  when  the  piers  were 
finished,  commencing  at  the  upper  part; 
semicircular  troughs  of  cement  having 
been  placed  at  the  bottom  of  the  excava- 
tion to  afford  continuous  drainage,  over 
which  a  layer  of  quick-setting  concrete 
was  deposited  (Figs.  3  and  4). 


Fig.  3. 


Fig,  4, 


SEWERS  AT  GRENOBLE 


One  means  of  reaching  a  solid  founda- 
tion without  removing  the  upper  layer 
of  soft  soil  is  by  piling,  but  piles  are  lia- 


12 

ble  to  decay  in  many  soils.  In  Holland, 
buildings  on  piles  of  larch,  alder,  and  fir 
have  lasted  for  centuries,  whilst  in 
Belgium  large  buildings  have  been  en- 
dangered by  the  decay  of  the  piles  on 
which  they  rest.  Sometimes  columns  of 
masonry  support  the  superstructure,  but, 
being  placed  farther  apart  than  piles,  it 
is  necessary  to  connect  them  with  arches 
at  the  surface  for  carrying  the  walls. 
Piers,  however,  of -viaducts  supporting  a 
heavy  load  must  be  carried  down  in  one 
mass  to  the  solid  ground,  as  in  the  case 
of  the  viaduct  of  Otzaurte,  on  the  Rio 
Salera  in  Spain,  where  it  was  necessary 
to  get  through  sixty-five  feet  of  silty 
clay  to  lay  the  foundations  of  a  pier 
thirty-one  feet  long  by  thirteen  feet 
wide.  In  order  to  avoid  getting  out  so 
large  an  excavation  in  one  piece,  a  well 
was  dug,  four  feet  wide,  and  extending 
across  the  whole  width,  thirteen  feet,  of 
the  pier,  so  as  to  divide  it  into  two  equal 
portions  (Fig.  5).  A  chamber,  nine  feet 
ten  inches  high,  was  then  driven  at  the 
bottom,  like  a  heading,  as  far  as  the 


13 

limits  of  one-half  of  the  foundation  of 
the   pier,  and   built   up  with   masonry. 

Fig.  5. 


OTZAURTE 

The  other  half  was  similarly  dealt  with, 
and  the  excavation  and  masonry  were 
carried  up  in  successive  lifts  of  nine  feet 
ten  inches.  The  central  well  served  as 
a  means  of  access  for  pumping  out  the 


14 

water,  for  the  removal  of  earthwork,  and 
for  the  supply  of  materials. 

To  avoid  the  difficulty  and  expense  of 
timbering  deep  foundations  a  lining  of 
masonry  is  sometimes  sunk,  by  gradually 
excavating  the  ground  underneath,  and 
weighting  the  masonry  cylinder,  which 
is  eventually  filled  in  with  rubble  stone, 
concrete,  or  masonry,  and  serves  as  a 
pier. 

In  India  a  similar  system  has  been  fol- 
lowed for  centuries  for  sinking  wells. 
The  linings  are  made  in  radiating  courses 
of  bricks  or  stones;  the  first  length,  from 
five  to  ten  feet  high,  being  put  on  a  cir- 
cular wooden  framework  placed  on  the 
surface  of  the  ground.  Very  fine  sand 
is  used  for  filling  the  joints,  except  for 
the  two  or  three  top  courses,  which  are 
laid  in  mortar,  and  the  whole  construc- 
tion is  tightly  bound  together.  It  is 
then  gradually  sunk  by  a  man  inside 
undermining  it,  and  another  length  is 
placed  on  the  top.  As  these  operations 
are  generally  conducted  in  the  silty  or 
sandy  bed  of  rivers  which  become  dry 


15 

in  summer,  there  is  no  running  water  to 
contend  with,  but  water  percolates  into 
the  excavation,  and  then  the  natives  use 
a  "jham,"  by  which  they  remove  the 
earth  from  under  water.  Although  the 
external  diameter  of  the  wells  has  been 
sometimes  limited  to  five  feet,  the  ad- 
vantage of  larger  dimensions  in  securing 
a  vertical  descent  has  been  always  recog- 
nized. At  the  Western  Jumna  canal 
rectangular  linings  were  adopted  with 
advantage.  At  the  Solani  aqueduct  hol- 
low cubes  with  sides  twenty  feet  long, 
and  at  Dunowri  oblong  or  square  linings, 
thirty  feet  long  and  twenty  feet  deep, 
and  subdivided  into  three  or  four  com- 
partments, were  used. 

When  the  stratum  of  soft  soil  is  too 
thick  for  the  foundations  to  be  placed 
below  it,  the  soil  must  be  consolidated; 
or  the  area  of  the  foundation  must  be 
sufficiently  extended  to  enable  the  ground 
to  support  the  load.  The  ground  may 
be  consolidated  by  wooden  piles;  but  in 
soils  where  they  are  liable  to  decay,  pil- 
lars of  sand,  or  mortar,  or  concrete, 


16 

rammed  into  holes  previously  bored, 
may  be  used.  Artificial  foundations  are 
also  formed  by  placing  on  the  soft  ground 
either  a  timber  framework,  surrounded 
occasionally  by  .sheeting,  or  a  mass  of 
rubble  stone,  or  a  layer  of  concrete,  or  a 
thick  layer  of  fine  sand  spread  in  layers 
eight  to  ten  inches  thick,  which,  owing 
to  its  semifluidity,  equalizes  the  pressure. 
A  remarkable  example  of  this  method 
was  afforded  in  the  restoration,  in  1844, 
of  the  arched  way  at  the  Phillippeville 
gate,  at  Charleroi,  where  the  old  pile- 
work  foundations  had  twice  given  way. 
A  trench  was  dug  3^  feet  deep  and  3£ 
feet  wider  than  the  construction  on  each 
side,  and  inclosed  by  little  walls.  Into 
this  cavity  was  put  very  fine  sand,  mod- 
erately wetted,  then  a  layer  of  concrete, 
twenty  inches  thick,  and  upon  this  the 
masonry  was  built,  which  has  stood  per- 
fectly. When  the  bottom  of  the  exca- 
vation is  silty,  it  is  advisable  to  throw  a 
thick  layer  of  sand  over  it  before  driving 
piles,  as  the  sand  gives  consistency  to 
the  silt. 


17 

A  heavy  superstructure  is  partially 
supported  on  a  soft  foundation  by  the 
upward  pressure  due  to  the  depth  below 
the  surface  to  which  it  is  carried,  in  the 
same  manner  that  a  solid  floats  in  a 
liquid  when  it  displaces  a  volume  of 
water  equivalent  to  its  own  weight.  Ac- 
cording to  Rankine  a  building  will  be 
supported  when  the  pressure  at  its  base 

,  /1  +  sin  0\2 

is  wh  ( : — - 1  per  unit  of  area,  where 

\1— sm  <pj   J 

h  is  the  depth  of  the  foundation,  w  the 
weight  of  the  soft  ground  per  unit  of 
volume,  and  ^  the  angle  of  friction. 

Mr.  McAlpine,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  in  build- 
ing a  high  wall  at  Albany,  U.S.A.,  suc- 
ceeded in  safely  loading  a  wet  clay  soil 
with  two  tons  on  the  square  foot,  but 
with  a  settlement  depending  on  the 
depth  of  the  excavation.  In  order  to 
prevent  a  great  influx  of  water,  and  con- 
sequent softening  of  the  soil,  he  sur- 
rounded the  excavation  with  a  puddle 
trench,  ten  feet  high  and  four  feet  wide, 
and  he  also  spread  a  layer  of  course 
gravel  on  the  bottom. 


18 

When  the  foundation  is  not  homo- 
geneous it  is  necessary  to  provide  against 
unequal  settlement,  either  by  increasing 
the  bearing  surface  where  the  ground  is 
soft,  or  by  carrying  an  arch  over  the 
worst  portions. 

HYDRAULIC    FOUNDATIONS. 

Under  this  head  are  comprised  all 
foundations  in  rivers,  and  where  running 
water  has  to  be  contended  with. 

Foundations  are  laid  upon  the  natural 
surface  where  it  is  rocky,  also  on  beds  of 
gravel,  sand,  or  stiff  clay  secured  against 
scour  by  aprons,  sheeting,  rubble  stones, 
or  other  means  of  protection.  When 
the  foundations  are  to  be  pumped  dry, 
dams  are  resorted  to  if  the  depth  of 
water  is  less  than  ten  feet,  and  are  spe- 
cially applicable  to  the  abutments  of 
bridges,  where  the  water  is  less  deep 
and  rapid  and  the  bank  forms  one  side 
of  the  dam.  The  dam  can  be  made  of 
clay,  or  even  earth  free  from  stones  and 
roots,  with  slopes  of  1  to  1 ;  the  width 
at  the  top  being  about  equal  to  the 


19 

depth  of  water  when  the  depth  does  not 
exceed  three  feet  in  a  current,  or  ten  feet 
in  still  water.  The  leakage  of  a  dam 
and  the  danger  of  breaches  increase 
rapidly  in  proportion  to  the  head  of 
water.  At  Hollandsch  Diep  a  great  dam 
of  sand,  protected  from  the  waves  by 
fascines,  had  to  keep  out  a  head  of 
water  of  twenty-three  feet  at  high  tides 
from  the  foundations.  M.  de  la  Gour- 
nerie  constructed  a  temporary  dam  of 
silt,  4,265  feet  long,  at  St.  Nazaire,  in 
1849,  to  protect  the  shed  of  the  floating 
dock.  The  dam  was  thirteen  feet  high, 
four  feet  wide  at  the  top,  with  a  pitched 
slope  of  1  in  3  towards  the  sea,  and  an 
inner  slope  of  1  in  5. 

Concrete  makes  a  solid  dam,  but  it  is 
expensive  to  construct  and  difficult  to  re- 
move. A  masonry  dam  328  feet  long 
was  built  at  Lorient  in  1857. 

A  cofferdam  with  a  double  row  of  piles 
takes  up  less  space  and  is  less  liable  to 
be  worn  away  or  breached  than  an  earth- 
work dam.  At  the  Auray  viaduct  a  dam 
was  made  of  two  rows  of  piles,  with 


20 

boards  filling  up  the  spaces  between  the 
piles,  the  center  of  the  dam  being  filled 
with  well-punned  silt,  and  protected  out- 
side with  rubble  stones.  It  supported 
the  pressure  of  a  head  of  water  of  from 
five  to  eleven  feet;  its  average  cost  was 
£1  Os.  lOd.  per  lineal  foot.  The  width 
of  a  cofferdam  is  often  as  great  as  the 
head  of  water;  but  if  the  cofferdam  is 
strutted  inside,  so  that  the  clay  merely 
acts  as  a  watertight  lining,  the  width 
need  not  exceed  from  four  to  six  feet. 
In  a  cofferdam  of  concrete  at  Marseilles 
constructed  for  the  basin  of  the  graving 
docks,  the  widths  were  calculated  at  0.45 
of  the  total  height,  the  maximum  width 
has  thus  attained  twenty  feet. 

In  building  the  viaduct  of  Lorient,  on 
a  foundation  dry  at  low  water,  a  single 
row  of  strutted  piles,  3^  feet  apart, 
planked  from  top  to  bottom  on  both 
sides,  was  used  (Fig.  6),  and  the  space 
between  the  planking,  ten  inches  wide, 
was  filled  with  silt  pressed  down.  When 
the  filling  is  so  much  reduced  in  thickness 
the  planks  are  carefully  joined,  and  the 


21 

Fig.  6, 


LORIENT 

clay  is  mixed  with  moss  or  tow,  or  some 
times  with  fine  gravel  or  pounded  chalk. 
As  water  leaks  through  joints  and  con- 
nections, the  ties  are  placed  as  high  up 
as  possible,  and  the  bottom  is  scooped 
out  or  cleaned  before  the  clay  is  put  in. 
When  the  sim^s  of  the  part  to  be  inclosed 
are  sufficiently  close  they  may  be  effec- 
tually supported  by  a  series  of  stays,  as 
was  done  in  making  the  dam  for  the  con- 


22 

struction  of  the  apron  of  the  Melun  dam 
(Fig.  7),  where  struts  were  put  in  at  in- 
tervals of  16j  feet. 

Fig.  7. 


MELUN 

The  Grimsby  Dock  works,  and  the 
Thames  Embankment  works,  furnished 
examples  of  cofferdams  constructed  to 
bear  the  pressure  of  a  great  head  of 
water.  For  constructing  the  Zuider  Zee 
locks  on  the  Amsterdam  Canal  a  circular 
dam,  525  feet  in  diameter,  was  erected, 
consisting  of  a  double  row  of  sheet  pil- 
ing, the  piles  being  one  foot  square  and 
fifty  feet  long,  with  walings  attached. 
Eventually,  in  consequence  of  accidents, 
a  third  row  was  added,  and  the  dam  fur- 
ther strengthened  by  sloping  banks  of 
sand  on  both  sides,  the  outer  slope  being 
protected  by  clay  and  fascine  work.  The 
head  of  water  against  the  dam  was  oc- 
casionally twenty  feet. 


23 

If  large  springs  burst  out  in  an  exca- 
vation they  must  be  either  stopped  up 
with  clay  or  cement,  or  be  confined  with- 
in a  wooden,  brick,  or  iron  pipe  in  which 
the  water  rises  till  the  pressure  is  equal- 
ized, and  then  it  is  stopped  up  as  soon  as 
the  masonry  is  sufficiently  advanced  and 
thoroughly  set.  If,  however,  there  is  a 
general  leakage  over  the  whole  bottom 
of  the  excavation  it  must  be  stopped  by 
a  layer  of  concrete,  incorporated  with 
the  foundation  courses  (Fig.  8). 

I   Fig,  8, 


Cofferdams  or  troughs  o'f  concrete  had 
been  used  on  a  large  scale  at  Toulon  and 
Algiers  for  the  construction  of  repairing 
docks. 

Where  there  is  not  space  for  a  clay 
dam,  timber  sheeting  well  strutted  and 


24 

caulked  is  used.  For  instance  at  the 
Custom-house  quay  of  Rio  de  Janeiro  a 
dam  of  square  sheet  piling,  with  coun- 
terforts of  cross  sheet  piling,  and  made 
watertight  by  hoop  iron  let  into  grooves 
in  each  pile,  served  to  support  the  press- 
ure of  about  twenty-three  feet  of  water. 
A  similar  structure,  however,  at  the 
West  India  Docks  was  floated  away  by 
an  equinoctial  spring  tide,  owing  to  the 
want  of  tenacity  of  the  ground.  When 
the  head  of  water  is  under  five  feet, 
tarred  canvas  is  sufficient  to  keep  it  out, 
the  canvas  being  weighted  at  the  bot- 
tom, and  nailed  to  a  beam  at  the  top.  It 
is  in  every  instance  advisable  to  take  out 
the  earth  work  for  foundations  in  lengths. 

In  the  construction  of  the  Victoria 
Docks  a  metallic  cofferdam  was  used, 
which  was  very  easily  displaced  by  float- 
ing. 

Hollow  timber  frames  without  a  bot- 
tom, and  made  watertight  at  the  bottom 
after  being  lowered  by  concrete  or  clay, 
are  suitable  in  water  from  six  to  twenty 
feet  deep  on  rocky  beds,  or  where  there 


25 

is  only  a  slight  layer  of  silt.  This  meth- 
od was  resorted  to  by  M.  Beaudemoulin, 
between  1857  and  1861,  at  the  St. 
Michael,  Solferino,  Change  and  Louis 
Philippe  bridges  at  Paris.  The  timber 
frame  at  the  St.  Michael  bridge  was  fif- 
teen feet  nine  inches  high,  125  feet  long, 
and  nineteen  feet  eight  inches  wide  at 
the  base,  with  a  batter  of  1  in  5 ;  the  up- 
rights were  six  inches  square,  and  6j  feet 
apart;  the  framework  was  made  of  oak, 
and  the  planks  of  deal  (nine  inches  by 
three  inches),  the  spaces  between  them 
being  covered  by  small  laths  nailed  on 
to  the  planks.  Fourteen  crabs  placed  on 
four  boats  supported  the  framing,  and 
let  it  down  as  it  was  built  up;  this  was 
weighted  with  stones  to  sink  it  on 
the  foundations  prepared  by  dredging, 
and  the  planks  were  then  slipped  between 
the  walings  and  beaten  down  lightly. 
A  toe  of  rubble  stone  outside  supported 
the  pressure  of  the  concrete  inside.  The 
whole  operation  took  ten  days,  and  in 
one  month  the  masonry  was  finished  up 
to  the  plinth.  The  caisson,  including 
erection,  coat  £560. 


26 

The  caissons  of  the  bridges  at  Vienna, 
sunk  twelve  feet  below  water  level,  cost 
£2  18s.  6d.  per  lineal  yard  of  circumfer- 
ence. At  the  Point-du-Jour  viaduct  the 
caissons  were  131  feet  long,  and  from 
twenty-six  to  thirty-three  feet  wide,  and' 
from  twenty- one  to  twenty-six  feet  high. 
The  long  sides  were  put  together  flat  on 
the  ground,  and  were  lifted  up  to  allow 
of  the  short  sides  being  fixed  to  them. 
A  few  hours  sufficed  for  depositing,  the 
caisson  in  its  place.  M.  Picard  in  recon- 
structing the  Bezons  bridge,  after  the 
war  of  1870,  used  caissons  in  two  por- 
tions, as  the  lower  portion  had  to  re- 
main, whilst  the  upper  portion  was  only 
needed  for  a  time.  Some  nails  and 
straps  fastened  the  two  parts  together. 
A  layer  of  clay  was  placed  under  the 
rubble  toe  outside,  to  prevent  leakage 
between  the  concrete  and  the  planks. 
This  expedient  was  first  adopted  by  M. 
Desnoyers,  in  order  to  pump  dry  the 
foundation  which  he  carried  down  into 
the  clay,  so  as  to  build  masonry  walls  on 
the  bottom  without  using  concrete.  At 


27 


the  Aulne  viaduct  in  Brittany,  MM. 
Desnoyers  and  Arnoux  made  a  caisson 
seventy-five  feet  six  inches  by  thirty-four 
feet  nine  inches,  and  nearly  twenty-three 
feet  high  (Fig.  9),  and,  with  the  exeep- 

Fig.9. 

Qufaon 

immersed    \       afloat 


AULNE 


tion  of  the  bottom  portion,  caulked  be- 
forehand. When  it  was  deposited  the 
bottom  planks  were  slid  down  between 
the  lower  set  of  walings,  and  a  toe  of 
puddled  clay  "A,"  protected  from  the 
rush  of  the  current  by  canvas,  was  put 
round  the  bottom  outside.  The  caisson 
was  so  watertight  that  a  Letestu  pump 


working  two  or  three  hours  each  day 
kept  the  foundations  perfectly  dry. 
When  the  caisson,  put  together  on  a 
stage  supported  on  eight  boats,  was 
ready  for  depositing,  the  sluice  door's  of 
the  Guily-Glas  dam  were  opened,  lower- 
ing the  caisson  till  the  projecting  pieces 
"  B  "  touched  the  ground,  and  by  cutting 
the  beams  fastening  these  projections  to 
the  boats,  the  boats  were  set  free.  As 
the  tide  rose  the  caisson  floated,  and  the 
boats  were  attached  to  its  upper  part, 
which,  by  lightening,  lifted  it  sufficiently 
for  the  projecting  pieces  to  be  taken  off. 
The  depositing  was  completed  by  open- 
ing the  sluices  of  the  dam  at  high 
water,  and  as  the  water  fell  the  caisson, 
weighted  with  rails,  sank  on  the  dredged 
bottom.  Thus  by  the  help  of  water 
alone  a  mass  weighing  seventy-four  tons 
was  safely  and  accurately  deposited. 
The  cost  of  one  caisson  was  £740;  and 
the  cost  of  the  foundation  below  low 
water  did  not  exceed  £1  12s.  6d.  per 
cubic  yard.  At  Lorient  large  caissons, 
from  twenty-three  to  twenty-four  feet 


29 

high,  were  employed;  but  an  interior 
dam  of  concrete  forming  a  permanent 
part  of  the  foundation  was  used  instead 
of  an  external  toe  of  clay.  At  Quimperle 
M.  Dubreil  made  the  caisson  watertight 
by  a  dam  of  clay  inside,  which  necessi- 
tated a  somewhat  larger  caisson,  but 
admitted  of  the  removal  of  the  timber. 

When  a  limit  to  the  space  occupied  is 
immaterial,  as  oil  the  large  American 
rivers,  a  sort  of  double-cased  crib -work 
dam  is  frequently  adopted.  M.  Male- 
zieux  has  {given  various  details  of  this 
class  of  work,  such  as  the  cofferdam  in 
Lake  Michigan  to  obtain  the  water  sup- 
ply for  Chigaco.  A  caisson  200  feet 
long  and  98  feet  wide,  inclosed  by 
double  watertight  sides  from  thirteen 
to  nineteen  feet  high,  was  used  at  Mon- 
treal on  the  St.  Lawrence.  The  interval 
between  the  two  sides  was  about  eleven 
feet  wide,  and  planked  at  the  bottom  so 
that  the  caisson  could  be  floated  into- 
place.  When  the  caisson  was  sunk, 
piles  were  driven  in  holes  made  in  the 
bed  of  the  river  to  keep  it  in  place,  and 


30 

the  bottom  was  made  watertight  by  a 
lining  at  the  sides  of  beams  and  clay. 
These  kinds  of  caissons  are  only  suitable 
where  the  bottom  is  carefully  levelled. 
Although  iron  caissons  are  generally 
used  for  penetrating  some  distance  into 
the  soil,  there  are  instances  of  iron  cais- 
sons being  merely  deposited  upon  the 
natural  bed.  M.  Pluyette  founded  one 
of  the  large  piers  at  Nogent  sur-Marne 
in  a  plate  iron  caisson,  which  weighed 
about  seventy  tons,  and  cost  £  3,600, 
with  a  bed  of  concrete  in  it  ten  feet  thick 
and  protected  by  rubble  stone.  Its 
dimensions  at  the  bottom  were  seventy- 
two  feet  by  37f  feet,  with  rounded  cor- 
ners and  a  batter  of  1  in  15,  29^  feet 
high,  including  a  length  of  five  feet, 
which  could  be  removed  when  the  work 
was  finished.  The  thickness  of  the 
plates  was  from  J  inch  to  J  inch,  and  it 
was  strutted  inside  with  timber.  The 
same  system  was  adopted  at  Breme, 
where  caissons  sixty-nine  feet  by  16^ 
feet  were  used  for  the  four  ordinary 
piers,  and  the  width  increased  to 


31 

feet  for  the  pier  on  which  the  bridge 
turns;  their  height  was  ll£  feet,  and 
the  thickness  of  the  plates  f  inch.  The 
operation  of  sinking  the  caissons  from  a 
floating  stage  occupied  about  seven 
hours.  A  layer  of  concrete  nine  feet 
thick  was  spread  over  the  bottom  and 
left  for  twelve  weeks  to  set  before  the 
water  was  pumped  out. 

The  methods  employed  for  laying 
foundations  in  the  water,  either  on  the 
natural  surface  or  after  a  slight  amount 
of  dredging,  have  next  to  be  considered. 

A  rubble  mound  foundation  is  some- 
times employed  for  dams  where  any 
settlement  can  be  repaired  by  adding 
fresh  material  on  the  top;  also  for  land- 
ing-piers in  lakes  by  solidifying  the 
upper  portion  with  concrete,  and  in 
breakwaters  where  a  masonry  super- 
structure is  erected  on  the  top.  Such  a 
method,  however,  is  not  suitable  where 
a  slight  settlement  would  be  injurious; 
and  in  the  sea  the  base  of  the  mound  is 
generally  less  exposed  to  scour  than  in  a 
river. 


32 

Another  method  consists  in  sinking  a 
framing,  not  made  watertight,  inside 
which  concrete  is  run,  and  the  framing 
remains  as  a  protection  for  the  concrete, 
and  is  surrounded  by  a  toe  of  rubble.  If 
the  framing  is  of  some  depth  iron  tie- 
rods  are  put  in  by  divers  after  the  bot- 
tom has  been  dredged,  to  enable  the 
framing  to  support  the  pressure  of  the 
concrete.  When  piles  can  be  driven  the 
framing  is  fixed  to,  them.  The  piles, 
five  to  eight  feet  apart,  have  a  double 
row  of  walings  fixed  to  them,  between 
which  close  planking  is  driven,  from  ten 
to  fourteen  inches  wide,  and  from  three 
to  five  inches  thick,  and  sometimes, 
when  the  scour  of  a  sandy  subsoil  has  to 
be  prevented,  the  planks  are  grooved 
and  tongued,  or  have  covering  pieces 
put  on  by  divers,  or  are  driven  in  close 
panels.  The  insufficiency  of  a  simple 
framing  of  planks  for  foundations  on 
running  sand  was  demonstrated  by  the 
destruction  of  the  Arroux  bridge  at 
Digoin,  and  the  Gue-Moucault  bridge 
over  the  Somme  by  the  flood  of  Septem- 


ber  1866,  in  spite  of  the  fascines  and 
rubble  stone  protecting  their  piers,  owing 
to  the  washing  out  of  the  underlying 
sand  through  small  interstices  by  the 
rapid  whirling  current.  The  cost  per 
superficial  yard  of  a  casing  formed  with 
piles  and  planks  is  about  £  1,  including 
the  cost  of  driving  6j  feet. 

Open  framing  is  sometimes  used  for 
inclosing  a  mound  of  rubble  stone. 
These  mounds  require  examination  after 
floods,  and  renewing  t#l  the  mound  has 
become  perfectly  stable. 

In  permeable  soils  foundations  of  con- 
crete inclosed  in  frames  are  frequently 
employed,  as,  for  instance,  for  the 
foundations  of  the  Saints  Peres,  Jena, 
Austerlitz,  and  Alma  bridges  at  Paris  ; 
but  in  silty  and  watertight  soils  founda- 
tions in  excavations  pumped  dry  are 
preferable. 

The  bed  of  the  Rhone  at  Tarascon, 
consisting  of  sand  and  gravel,  in  which 
piles  are  difficult  to  drive,  is  subject  to 
scour  in  floods  to  a  depth  of  46  feet. 
Foundations,  however,  were  laid  there, 


34 

at  considerable  expense,  by  frames  with 
double  linings,  ten  feet  apart,  in  which 
large  blocks  were  placed  with  unhewn 
stones  on  them;  the  ground  was  then 
dredged  inside  the  frames  to  twenty- 
eight  feet  below  low- water  level,  and  260 
cubic  yards  of  concrete  were  deposited 
in  twenty-four  hours. 

Lastly,  concrete  can  be  deposited  in 
situ  for  bridge  foundations;  and  though 
concrete  blocks  are  only  used  in  sea 
works,  bags  of  concrete,  like  those  at 
Aberdeen,  by  Mr.  Dyce  Cay,  M.  Inst. 
G.E.,  might  be  sometimes  employed,  in- 
stead of  rubble  stones,  for  forming  the 
base  of  piers  or  for  preventing  scour. 

Piles  are  used  where  a  considerable 
thickness  of  soft  ground  overlies  a  firm 
stratum,  when  the  upper  layer  has  suffi- 
cient consistency  to  afford  a  lateral  sup- 
port to  the  piles,  otherwise  masonry  piers 
must  be  adopted. 

The  piles  are  usually  placed  from  2j 
to  5  feet  apart,  center  to  center,  and  the 
distance  is  occasionally  increased  to  6£ 
feet  for  quays  or  other  works  only  slight- 


'V*'   OP  THR 

TT  "?7*  T^  ?"  T 


35 

ly  loaded.  Sometimes  under 
or  retaining  walls  the  piles  are  driven 
obliquely  to  follow  the  line  of  thrust. 
The  Libourne  bridge  rests  on  piles  2j 
feet  apart,  and  driven  about  forty  feet  in 
sand  and  silt.  At  the  Youlzie  viaduct, 
on  the  Paris  and  Mulhouse  railway,  some 
piles  were  driven  eighty  feet  without 
reaching  solid  ground,  and  the  ground 
between  the  piles  had  to  be  dredged,  and 
replaced  by  a  thick  layer  of  concrete. 
Piles  which  have  not  reached  firm  ground 
sustain  loads  nevertheless,  owing  to  the 
lateral  friction,  as,  for  instance,  in  the 
soft  clay  at  La  Rochelle  and  Rochefort 
piles  can  support  164lbs.  per  square  foot 
of  lateral  contact,  and  123  Ibs.  in  the  silt 
at  Lorient.  On  the  Cornwall  railway, 
viaducts  were  built  upon  piles,  sixty-five 
to  eighty  feet  long,  driven,  in  groups  of 
four  fastened  close  together,  by  a  four- 
ton  monkey  with  a  small  fall.  A  timber 
grating  is  fastened  to  the  top  of  the 
piles,  or  a  layer  of  concrete  is  deposited, 
as  at  Dirschau,  Hollandsch  Diep,  and 
Dordrecht;  or  both  grating  and  concrete, 


36 

as  the  'grating  distributes  the  load  and 
strengthens  the  piles.  Planking  is 
sometimes  put  on  the  framing  which  dis- 
tributes the  pressure,  as  at  London 
Bridge,  but  it  is  considered  objectionable 
as  it  prevents  any  connection  between 
the  superstructure  and  the  concrete,  and 
increases  the  chance  of  sliding.  The 
space  between  the  piles  from  the  river 
bed  to  low  water  is  sometimes  filled  with 
rubble  stones,  and  sometimes  with  con- 
crete (Fig.  10),  which  is  less  liable  Bto 


disturbance.  When  the  ground  is  very 
soft  a  filling  of  clay  has  been  preferred 
on  account  of  its  being  lighter  than  con- 
crete. 


3V 

A  mixed  system  of  piling  and  water- 
tight caissons,  of  rubble  filling  and  con- 
crete, was  adopted  at  the  Yernon  bridge. 
After  the  piles  had  been  driven  the 
spaces  between  them  were  filled  up  to 
half  the  depth  of  water  with  rubble 
stones:  a  caisson  ten  feet  high  was  then 
placed  on  the  top,  and  a  bottom  layer  of 
concrete  deposited  in  it.  In  a  month's 
time  the  interior  of  the  caisson  was 
pumped  dry,  the  heads  of  the  piles  cut 
off,  and  the  filling  with  cement  concrete 
completed  to  low-water  level.  The  cais- 
son was  cut  off  to  the  level  of  the  grat- 
ing as  soon  as  the  pier  was  well  above 
water.  The  foundation  cost  altogether 
£14  8s.  per  square  yard  of  base  of  the 
pier. 

The  heavy  ram  of  Nasmyth  moved  by 
steam,  with  a  small  fall,  but  giving  sixty 
to  eighty  blows  per  minute,  enabled  piles 
to  be  driven  thirty-three  feet  in  a  few 
minutes,  and  with  much  less  chance  of 
divergence  or  jumping  than  in  driving 
with  less  powerful  engines.  In  certain 
soils,  in  which  there  is  a  momentary  re- 


38 

sistance  during  pile-driving,  it  has  been 
proposed  to  bore  holes  in  which  the  pile 
should  be  afterwards  driven. 

At  St.  Louis  the  annular  piles,  3^  feet 
in  diameter,  made  of  eight  pieces  of 
wood,  used  for  guiding  the  pneumatic 
caisson,  were  driven  by  the  aid  of  the 
hydraulic  sand-pump  working  inside,  the 
invention  of  Mr.  Eads3  M.  Inst.  C.E. 

The  load  that  a  pile  driven  home  and 
secure  from  lateral  flexion  can  bear  may 
be  estimated  at  from  one-tenth  to  one- 
eighth  of  the  crushing  load,  which  varies 
between  5,700  and  8,500  Ibs.  per  square 
inch.  Thus,  taking  a  fair  load  of  710 
Ibs.  per  square  inch,  a  small  pile  of  seven 
inches  diameter  will  bear  about  twelve 
tons,  and  a  pile  of  eighteen  inches  diam- 
eter will  bear  about  eighty  tons,  and  a 
pile  to  bear  the  load  of  twenty-five  tons 
used  as  a  unit  by  M.  Perronet  should  be 
about  ten  inches  in  diameter.  Accord- 
ing to  M.  Perronet  a  pile  can  support  a 
load  of  twenty-five  tons  as  soon  as  it  re- 
fuses to  move  more  than  f  inch  under 
thirty  blows  of  a  monkey,  weighing 


39 

eleven  cwts.  ninety  Ibs.,  falling  four  feet 
or  under  ten  blows  of  the  same  monkey 
falling  twelve  feet.  At  Neuilly,  how- 
ever, M.  Perronet  placed  a  load  of  fifty- 
one  tons  on  piles  thirteen  inches  square, 
but  driving  the  pile  till  it  refused  to 
move  more  than  -f$-  inch  under  twenty- 
five  blows  of  a  monkey  of  the  same 
weight  falling  4^  feet;  but  such  a  load 
is  unusual.  At  Bordeaux  the  driving 
was  stopped  when  the  pile  did  not  go 
down  more  than  -^-  inch  under  ten  blows 
of  a  monkey,  weighing  1,100  Ibs.,  falling 
about  fifteen  feet,  but  one  of  the  piers 
settled  considerably,  the  load  on  a  pile 
being  twenty-two  tons  ;  whereas  at 
Rouen,  by  insisting  on  M.  Perronet's 
rule,  no  settlement  occurred. 

From  experiments  made  at  the  Orleans 
viaduct,  M.  Sazilly  concluded  that  piles 
might  support  with  security  a  load  of 
forty  tons  when  they  refuse  to  move 
more  than  If  inch  under  ten  blows  of  a 
monkey  weighing  fifteen  cwts.  and  falling 
about  thirteen  feet. 

Various  formulae  have  been  framed  for 


40 

calculating  the  safe  load  on  piles,  which 
are  quoted  in  a  paper  by  Mr.  McAlpine, 
M.  Inst.  C.E.,  on  "  The  Supporting  Pow- 
er of  Piles,"  and  in  a  Paper  on  "The 
Dordrecht  Railway  Bridge,"  by  Sir  John 
Alleyne,  Bart.,  M.  Inst.  C.E.  If  Weis- 
bach's  formula  is  applied  to  M.  Perro- 
net's  rule  it  appears  that,  assuming  a  safe 
load,  the  limiting  set  of  the  pile  might 
be  3j  inches  instead  of  f  inch  for  ten 
blows;  and  the  formula  shows  that  large 
monkeys  should  be  adopted  in  prefer- 
ence to  a  large  fall,  and  in  this  it  agrees 
with  practice  for  preventing  injury  to 
the  piles. 

In  order  to  provide  against  the  danger 
of  overturning  in  silty  ground,  the  ground 
is  sometimes  first  compressed  by  loading 
it  with  an  embankment,  which  is  cut 
away  after  a  few  months  at  those  places 
where  foundations  are  to  be  built.  At 
the  Oust  bridge  it  was  even  necessary  to 
connect  the  piers  and  abutments  by  a 
wooden  apron,  which,  for  additional 
security,  was  surrounded  by  concrete 
(Fig.  11).  The  abutment  was  made 


41 


Fig,  II. 


OUST    VIADUCT 

hollow  to  lighten  it,  and  the  embank- 
ment, "R,"  had  compressed  the  silty 
ground  to  m  ,n.  The  foundations  cost 
£  23  Is.  7d.  per  superficial  yard  for 
depths  of  from  thirty-three  to  forty -three 
feet  from  the  natural  surface  to  the  rock, 
or  £  1  16s.  lOd.  per  cubic  yard,  a  high 
price  due  to  the  difficulties  met  with  and 
the  bad  weather.  At  the  bridge  of 
Bouchemaine,  near  Angers,  the  bending 
of  the  piles,  which  traverse  about  twenty 
feet  of  silt,  was  stopped  by  surrounding 
them  with  great  masses  of  rubble 
stones. 

Occasionally  foundations  on  piles  have 
failed   or  suffered  great  sets  or  lateral 


42 

displacements.  At  the  Tours  bridge, 
many  arches  have  fallen  at  successive 
times;  holes  in  the  foundations  had  to 
be  refilled  with  lime,  and  below  certain 
arches  a  general  bed  of  concrete  was 
afterwards  established. 

Floating  caissons  require  a  bottom 
carefully  levelled,  on  which  to  be  lower- 
ed. Labelye,  in  1750,  deposited  the 
caissons  of  old  Westminster  bridge  on 
the  dredged  bottom  of  the  river;  but 
usually  this  kind  of  caisson  is  deposited 
on  piles  cut  off  to  one  level.  These  cais- 
sons have  oak  bottoms  and  movable 
sides  of  fir,  and  enable  the  masonry  piers 
built  inside  to  be  lowered  on  piles  pre- 
viously driven.  The  oak  bottom  serves 
as  a  platform  for  the  pier,  and  the  mova- 
ble fir  sides  can  be  used  again  for  other 
caissons.  At  Ivry,  with  only  two  sets 
of  movable  sides,  the  contractor  was  able 
to  put  four  caissons  in  place  in  one 
month.  The  bottom,  which  consists  of 
a  single  or  double  platform,  has  timbers 
projecting  underneath  which  fit  on  to 
the  rows  of  piles.  The  movable  sides 


43 

are  sometimes  made  in  panels*which  fit 
into  grooves  both  in  the  bottom  framing 
and  in  upright  posts,  placed  about  ten 
feet  apart,  which  are  tenoned  at  the  bot- 
tom, and  kept  in  place  at  the  top  by 
transoms  going  across  the  caisson.  The 
different  parts  of  the  sides  are  tightly 
pressed  together  by  the  bolt,  A  B  (Fig. 
12).  In  other  instances,  as  at  the  bridge 

Fig     12, 


of  Yal  Benoit  over  the  Meuse,  the  sides 
butt  against  the  vertical  sides  of  the 
bottom,  against  which  they  are  pressed 
by  keyed  bolts,  D,  placed  at  intervals  of 
five  feet  (Fig.  13).  The  caisson  is  kept 
near  the  shore  whilst  the  first  courses  of 
masonry  are  being  built  in  it;  it  is  then, 


44 


on  a  favorable  opportunity,  floated  over 
the  site  of  the  pier  prepared  to  receive 
it,  and  is  gradually  sunk  by  letting  in 
water. 

At  the  Bordeaux  bridge  the  caissons 
had  a  height  of  twenty-six  feet,  and 
were  divided  in  cases  by  transverse  rods. 
This  work,  which  comprises  seventeen 
arches,  was  founded  in  a  great  depth  of 
water,  about  the  year  1820,  by  the  engi- 
neers Deschamps  and  Billandel. 


Fig,  13. 


Fig,  14. 


1,4 


VAL    BENOIT 


In  sea  works  the  laying  of  foundations 
in  the  water  is  managed  differently. 
Thus  artificial  blocks  of  concrete  may  be 
deposited  by  the  help  of  divers,  as  at 


45 

Dover  pier;  or  much  larger  masses  may 
be  moved  by  powerful  machinery,  as, 
for  instance,  blocks  of  150  to  200  tons 
put  down  at  Brest  in  1868,  and  at  Dublin 
by  Mr.  Stoney,  M.  Inst.  C.E.  For  small 
landing  piers,  and  for  piers  of  bridges  in 
rivers  not  exposed  to  the  breaking  up  of 
ice,  artificial  blocks  or  metallic  frame- 
works may  be  placed  under  water  on  the 
top  of  timber  piles  cut  off  level,  a  plan 
adopted  by  Mr.  Maynard,  M.  Inst.  C.E., 
on  a  foundation  of  screw  piles. 

Screw  piles  were  introduced  by  Mr. 
Mitchell,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  for  securing 
buoys.  They  can  be  applied  with  ad- 
vantage to  the  construction  of  bollards 
and  beacons,  on  account  of  the  resistance 
they  offer  to  drawing  out;  but  as  in  the 
process  of  screwing  down  the  ground  is 
more  or  less  loosened,  judgment  must  be 
used  in  employing  them  for  mooring  or 
warping  buoys.  In  foundations  for 
beacons  they  should  be  screwed  down 
from  fifteen  to  twenty  feet  below  the 
level  to  which  the  shifting  sand  is  liable 
to  be  lowered.  Even  when  all  cohesion 


46 

of  the  ground  is  destroyed  in  screwing 
down  a  pile,  a  conical  mass,  with  its 
apex  at  the  bottom  of  the  pile  and  its 
base  at  the  surface,  would  have  to  be 
lifted  to  draw  the  pile  out.  The  re- 
sistance to  settlement  is  also  increased 
by  the  bearing  surface  of  the  screw;  and 
the  screw  pile  is  accordingly  to  be  pre- 
ferred to  an  ordinary  pile  in  soft  strata 
of  indefinite  depth,  or  when  the  shocks 
produced  by  ordinary  pile-driving  are 
liable  to  produce  a  disturbance.  The 
screw  pile  has  likewise  the  advantage  of 
being  easily  taken  up. 

Screw  piles  have  been  principally  used 
in  England  and  in  the  United  States. 
They  have  usually  one  or  two  spirals  pro- 
jecting considerably  from  the  shaft,  these 
spirals  being  cylindrical  for  soft  ground 
and  conical  for  hard  ground,  and  either 
of  wrought  iron  or  of  cast  iron.  The 
shaft  may  be  of  wood  or,  by  preference, 
of  iron,  which  must  be  pointed  at  the 
end  for  hard  ground,  but  cylindrical  and 
hollow  when  the  ground  is  soft.  The 
screw  will  penetrate  most  soils  except 


47 

hard  rock;  it  can  get  a  short  way  into 
compact  marl  through  loose  pebbles  and 
stones,  and  even  enter  coral  reefs.  A 
screw  pile  turned  by  eight  capstan  bars, 
twenty  feet  long,  each  moved  by  four  or 
five  men,  with  a  screw  four  feet  in  dia- 
meter, passed  in  less  than  two  hours 
through  a  stratum  of  sand  and  clay  more 
than  twenty  feet  thick,  the  surface  of 
which  was  about  twenty  feet  below 
water,  and  dug  itself  to  a  depth  of  about 
one  foot  into  an  underlying  schistous 
rock.  At  the  Clevedon  pier  screw  piles 
penetrated  hard  red  clay  to  depths  vary- 
ing between  seven  and  seventeen  feet, 
and  although  the  screw  had  a  pitch  of 
five  inches  they  rarely  went  down  more 
than  three  inches  in  one  turn.  Mr.  W. 
Lloyd,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  has  recorded  an 
unsuccessful  use  of  screw  piles,  which  in 
the  shifting  sandy  bed  of  a  South 
American  river  became  twisted  like  a 
corkscrew,  and  were  overturned  in  the 
first  breaking  up  of  the  ice.  At  Ham- 
burg screw  piles,  in  sets  of  three  and 
joined  at  the  top,  are  used  as  bollards. 


48 

The  piles  are  hollow  wrought-iron  tubes, 
§  inch  thick,  furnished  with  a  screw  both 
inside  and  out,  with  a  pitch  of  one  foot 
(Fig.  14).  To  screw  them  down  two 
capstans  were  used  to  pull  the  two  ends 
of  a  rope  wound  round  the  head  of  the 
pile,  the  force  transmitted  to  the  pile 
being  thirty  times  that  applied  at  an  arm 
of  the  capstan,  and  towards  the  close, 
when  the  pile  had  been  forced  down 
nearly  thirteen  feet,  seven  men  were  re- 
quired to  work  each  capstan.  At  the 
commencement  each  turn  of  the  screw 
produced  a  descent  of  ten  inches,  and 
hardly  nine  inches  at  the  end.  A  vessel 
struck,  in  1852,  against  one  of  these  bol- 
lards, and  broke  off  the  top  without 
shifting  the  piles. 

Piles  with  discs,  used  in  the  first  in- 
stance at  the  Leven  and  Kent  viaducts, 
by  Mr.  Brunlees,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  differ 
little  from  screw  piles  except  in  the 
method  of  sinking  them.  This  opera- 
tion was  performed  by  sending  a  jet  of 
water  down  a  wrought-iron  tube  inside 
the  cast-iron  pile,  which  washed  away 


49 

the  silty  sand  from  underneath  the  disc 
and  caused  the  pile  to  descend.  The 
sinking  cost  about  2s.  6d.  per  lineal  foot, 
whereas  at  Southport  pier,  where  water 
was  obtained  from  the  waterworks,  and 
ten  piles  were  sunk  per  tide,  the  sinking 
only  cost  4jd.  per  lineal  foot.  Wooden 
piles,  with  a  cast-iron  shoe  carrying  a 
disc,  might  easily  be  sunk  in  the  same 
manner,  the  water  pipe  being  carried 
eccentrically  through  the  disc. 

Hollow  wrought-iron  piles  have  also 
been  forced  down  by  blows  of  a  monkey, 
in  silty  and  sandy  ground  interspersed 
with  boulders,  to  a  depth  of  about  sixty 
feet;  the  thickness  of  the  piles  being 
about  one-nine  inch,  and  the  diameter 
19§  inches.  On  the  Cambrian  railway, 
Mr.  Conybeare,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  drove 
wooden  piles  down  below  the  surface,  by 
means  of  a  lengthening  piece  of  cast 
iron  on  the  top,  a  piece  of  wood  or  lead 
being  interposed  between  the  monkey 
and  the  cast  iron. 

Large  masonry  piers  carried  through 
thick  layers  of  soft  ground  to  a  solid  bed 


50 

may  be  constructed  by  various  methods, 
and  constitute  the  best  kind  of  founda- 
tion in  such  a  situation. 

The  method  of  cased  wells  is  suitable 
where  the  silt  is  sufficiently  compact  and 
watertight  to  admit  of  pumping  the  well 
dry,  and  where  the  depth  of  water  is 
small  and  can  easily  be  kept  out  by  a 
cofferdam  or  a  caisson  without  a  bottom. 
The  well  is  sunk  by  the  ordinary  meth- 
ods of  sinking  wells  or  driving  headings 
in  silty  ground.  At  the  Auray  viaduct, 
a  muddy  stratum,  twenty-six  feet  thick, 
was  got  through  by  this  method.  In 
building  the  abutment  of  a  bridge  over 
the  Yilaine,  in  Brittany,  resting  on  six 
pillars  carried  down  fifty  feet  below  the 
water-level,  the  same  method  was  adopt- 
ed; but  for  the  lower  portion  of  the  ex- 
cavation a  smaller  framing  had  to  be 
sunk  inside.  A  pillar  fifty  feet  deep  re- 
quires about  twenty  days  for  the  excava- 
tion, and  twelve  days  for  building  the 
masonry.  The  cost  is  from  £1  16s.  lOd. 
to  £2  9s.  per  cubic  yard  of  foundation 
complete.  When  the  pier  is  so  wide  as 


51 

to  render  the  strutting  difficult,  an  outer 
ring  can  be  first  lowered,  which  serves 
afterwards  as  a  casing  for  excavating 
the  inner  portion.  Where  permeable 
gravel  or  very  liquid  silt  has  to  be  tra- 
versed it  is  necessary  to  resort  to  tubular 
foundations. 

Cylindrical  foundations  are  sunk  with 
or  without  the  aid  of  compressed  air  ac- 
cording to  circumstances.  These  foun- 
dations possess  the  two  great  advantages 
of  being  capable  of  being  sunk  to  a  con- 
siderable depth,  and  of  presenting  the 
least  obstruction  to  the  current. 

In  a  clay  soil  the  cylinder  acts  as  a 
movable  cofferdam,  which  is  sunk  by 
being  weighted,  and  enables  the  foun- 
dations inside  to  be  built  up  easily  and 
cheaply.  This  method  was  first  adopted 
by  Mr.  Redman,  M.  Inst.  C.  E.,  .at 
Gravesend  ;  and  afterwards  at  the  Char- 
ing Cross  and  Cannon  Street  bridges  ; 
and  also  for  the  piers  of  the  Victoria 
bridge  over  the  Thames.  Iron  cylinders 
are  preferred  in  certain  cases  to  cylin- 
ders of  brick,  masonry,  or  concrete,  on 


52 

account  of  the  ease  with  which  they  are 
lowered  in  deep  water  on  to  the  river  bed; 
in  spite  of  the  disadvantages  attaching  to 
them  of  high  price,  of  the  considerable 
weights  required  for  sinking  them,  and 
lastly,  of  being  only  cases  for  the  actual 
piers. 

In  1823,  Sir  Mark  Brunei,  in  sinking 
the  wells  of  access  to  the  Thames  Tunnel 
used  linings  of  brickwork,  50  feet  in  di- 
ameter, and  resting  on  iron  frames  with 
vertical  tie-rods.  At  Rochefort,  M.  Guil- 
lemain  used  linings  of  masonry  resting 
on  plate-iron  rings  and  strengthened  by 
iron  chains;  the  wells  were  made  some- 
times 10  feet,  sometimes  13  feet  in  diam- 
eter, and  it  was  found  that  the  facility 
and  rate  of  descent  of  the  larger  linings 
more  than  compensated  for  the  additional 
material.  At  Lorient  the  Caudan  foot- 
bridge was  built  on  four  large  rectangu- 
lar frames,  sunk  from  50  to  60  feet  below 
high  water.  When  the  ground  is  very 
soft  it  has  a  tendency  to  run  into  these 
tubular  cofferdams  when  the  water  is 
pumped  out. 


53 

The  method  of  sinking  wells  in  India 
has  been  previously  referred  to.  Mr. 
Imrie  Bell,  M.  Inst.  C.  E.,  added  a  pole 
to  the  jham  used  by  the  natives  to  save 
the  trouble  of  diving,  but  even  with  this 
addition  the  process  was  slow.  The 
foundations  of  the  Poiney  viaduct,  on 
the  Madras  railway,  were  put  in  by  this 
method.  In  more  recent  works  the  curb 
was  made  of  iron  instead  of  wood,  and 
angular  as  in  the  case  of  the  Jumna 
bridge.  The  first  lengths  were  short,  5 
to  6  feet,  to  insure  a  vertical  descent;  then 
a  length  of  10  feet,  and  afterwards 
lengths  of  13  and  16  feet  were  added. 

At  the  Glasgow  bridge  the  lining  was  of 
cast-iron  rings,  being  easier  to  lower  in 
mid-stream;  but  for  the  quays  and  docks 
on  the  Clyde  linings  of  brickwork  and 
concrete  were  adopted  for  the  sake  of 
economy.  Mr.  Milroy,  Assoc.  Inst.  C.E., 
considers  that  with  concrete,  which  can 
be  moulded  to  an  edge  at  the  bottom,  all 
metal  additions  may  be  omitted  where 
only  silt  or»eand  have  to  be  traversed, 
and  that  the  bottom  ring  should  be  of 


54 

iron  for  penetrating  harder  soils.  In  the 
Clyde  extension  works  the  wells  were 
filled  up  with  concrete,  and  a  double  row 
of  cylinders  of  9  feet  diameter  were 
adopted  in  preference  to  a  single  row  of 
12  feet.  It  would  be  possible  in  this  ar- 
rangement to  take  out  the  sand  between 
the  adjacent  cylinders  and  form  them 
into  a  solid  mass  by  filling  up  these  inter- 
stices with  concrete.  Mr.  Ransome  used 
cylinders  of  "apsenite"  for  the  Hermitage 
wharf  on  the  Thames. 

The  Dutch  engineers  have  often  used 
oval-shaped  iron  tubes  sunk  by  dredging 
inside.  Thus  in  the  bridge  on  the  North 
Sea  Canal  the  piers  are  elliptical;  the  one 
on  which  the  opening  portion  turns  hav- 
ing axes  of  23  and  18  feet,  and  the  others 
axes  of  39  J  and  14  feet.  The  horizontal 
flanges  and  ribs  were  larger  where  the 
radius  of  curvature  is  increased,  and  the 
vertical  ribs  are  not  continuous,  but  ar- 
ranged so  as  to  overlap.  The  bridge 
over  the  Yssel,  on  the  Utrecht  and  Co- 
logne railway,  rests  upon  cylinders  which 
were  sunk  by  internal  dredging  17f  feet 
below  the  river  bed. 


XkilFOB^i 

In  France  sinking  cylinder^^t^^^ss^ 
ing  is  not  often  resorted  to  in  rivers,  pos- 
sibly owing  to  a  failure  of  this  system 
at  Perpignan,  where  the  sinking  of  a 
masonry  cylinder  by  dredging  was  stop- 
ped by  boulders,  and  compressed  air  had 
to  be  used.  However,  the  foundations 
of  bridges  at  Rivesaltes,  and  over  the 
Saone  at  Lyons,  and  the  jetty  made  at 
Havre  in  1861,  were  executed  by  this 
method.  For  the  walls  of  the  wet  dock 
of  Bordeaux  rectangular  wells  have  also 
been  sunk  by  dredging. 

The  extension  of  the  system  must 
depend  chiefly  on  improvements  in  the 
dredging  machinery,  of  which  the  suc- 
cessive steps  in  advance  already  attained 
may  be  noted. 

The  jham  was  suspended  by  Kennard's 
sand  pump.  With  this  machine  a  well, 
12^  feet  in  diameter,  was  sunk  in  the 
Jumna  8  to  10  inches  per  hour  by  four- 
teen workmen.  As  the  Kennard  pump 
was  not  able  to  work  in  the  compact  clays 
and  conglomerate  met  with  in  rebuilding 
the  bridges  over  the  Beas  and  the  Sutlej 


56 

Bull's  dredger  was  adopted,  which  con- 
sists of  a  semi-cylindrical  case  with  jaws 
opening  in  two  quadrants,  like  the  Amer- 
ican dredger  of  Morris  and  Cummings. 

Mr.  Stone,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  however, 
mentions  that  when  it  met  with  a  hard 
stratum  a  descent  of  only  2  feet  10  inches 
was  accomplished  in  three  months, 
whereas  in  the  upper  layer  the  progress 
was  much  more  rapid- than  with  the  sand- 
pump. 

Next  came  Mr.  Milroy's  "  excavator,' 
consisting  of  an  octagonal  frame  from 
which  are  suspended  eight  triangular 
spades.  These  spades  are  forced  vertical- 
ly into  the  ground  and  are  then  lifted  by 
chains  so  as  to  come  together  and  inclose 
the  earth,  which  can  then  be  raised  and 
discharged. 

At  the  Glasgow  bridge  the  progress 
was,  on  an  average,  11^  feet  per  day, 
and  the  maximum  20  feet.  At  Planta- 
tion Quay  the  average  for  a  cylinder  was 
about  4  feet  per  day,  but  these  cylinders 
were  impeded  in  their  sinking  by  tongues 
and  grooves,  so  that  double  this  rate 


57 

might  be  reckoned  on  for  unconnected 
cylinders.  Another  machine  is  the 
"screw  pan"  used  at  the  Loch  Ken 
viaduct,  a  conical  perforated  vessel,  the 
diameter  at  the  top  being  2  feet,  and 
furnished  at  the  bottom  with  a  screw 
which  enters  the  ground  when  turned. 

The  sand  and  mud  entering  the  vessel 
are  retained  by  little  leather  valves  when 
the  instrument  is  lifted.  It  works  well 
in  silt  and  clay ;  in  harder  soils  a  smaller 
vessel  is  needed. 

Lastly  there  is  the  "boring  head"  used 
by  Mr.  Bradford  Leslie,  M.  Inst.  C.E.^ 
at  the  Gorai  bridge.  A  revolving  plane 
with  blades  underneath,  able  to  disinte- 
grate hard  clays  and  compact  sand,  is 
worked  inside  the  cylinder,  and  at  the 
same  time  the  excavated  material  is 
drawn  up  and  removed  from  the  cylinder 
by  a  siphon.  To  maintain  an  upward 
pressure  in  the  siphon  the  level  of  the 
water  in  the  cylinder  is  always  kept 
higher  than  in  the  river.  The  boring- 
head  made  one  revolution  in  about  one 
minute  and  a  half  or  two  minutes,  and 


58 

excavated  through  clayey  and  sandy  silt 
at  a  rate  of  about  1  foot  per  hour.  One 
advantage  possessed  by  this  system  is 
that  the  rate  of  progress  is  independent 
of  the  depth.  The  side  piers  of  the 
Gorai  bridge  were  sunk  124  feet  below 
the  surface,  and  the  river  piers  98  feet 
below  low-water  level.  The  only  bridge 
the  foundations  of  which  have  been  car- 
ried down  as  deep  as  those  of  the  Gorai 
bridge  is  the  J3t.  Louis  bridge  over  the 
Mississippi;  but  the  method  of  com- 
pressed air  used  in  this  work,  looking  at 
the  difficulties  and  loss  of  life  attending 
it,  would  have  been  impracticable  with 
coolie  labor  at  Gorai.  The  system  of 
sinking  by  dredging  is  generally  to  be 
preferred  to  the  compressed  air  system, 
except  where  numerous  obstacles,  such 
as  boulders  or  embedded  trees,  are  met 
with. 

The  friction  between  cylinders  and 
the  soil  depends  on  the  nature  of  the 
soil  and  the  depth  of  sinking.  For  cast 
iron  sliding  through  gravel  the  co-effi- 
cient of  friction  is  between  2  and  3  tons 


59 

on  the  square  yard  for  small  depths,  and 
reaches  4  or  5  tons  where  the  depth  is 
between  20  and  30  feet.  In  certain  ad- 
hesive soils  it  would  be  more.  In  sinking 
the  brick  and  concrete  cylinders  in  the 
silt  of  the  Clyde  it  was  found  to  amount 
to  about  3j  tons  per  square  yard. 

Passing  on  to  the  consideration  of  the 
pneumatic  systems,  the  process  of  Dr. 
Potts  was  one  of  the  first  employed  for 
sinking  tubular  foundations  by  the  help 
of  air.  The  cylinder  in  process  of  being 
sunk  was  connected  with  a  vessel  in 
which  a  vacuum  was  produced,  and  a 
communication  between  them  being  sud- 
denly made  a  shock  was  produced  by  the 
rush  of  air.  By  this  means  Mr.  Cowper, 
M.  Inst.  C.E.,  succeeded  in  driving  down 
cylinders  5  feet  at  a  time.  The  only 
novelty  in  the  system  was  using  air  for 
applying  a  downward  pressure  on  the 
cylinder,  as  dredging  had  still  to  be  re- 
sorted to  for  removing  the  earth  from 
the  inside,  and,  moreover,  there  was  a 
considerable  influx  of  the  surrounding 
soil,  and  frequent  divergencies  from  the 


60 

perpendicular.  Mr.  Bramwell,  M.  Inst. 
C.E.,  observing  the  effects  produced  by 
the  rush  of  air  out  of  the  cylinder,  in  an 
aqueous  soil,  suggested  sinking  by  forc- 
ing water  from  the  interior  of  the  cylin- 
der towards  its  external  surface,  a  pro- 
cess which  would  disintegrate  the  earth 
lubricate  the  sliding  cylinder,  and  pre- 
vent the  influx  of  the  soil.  The  diffi- 
culties of  the  Potts  process  increase  with 
the  size  of  the  cylinder;  and  for  sinking 
the  cylinders,  10  feet  in  diameter,  of  the 
Shannon  bridge  it  was  abandoned  after 
an  unsuccessful  attempt. 

The  method  of  compressed  air  for 
enabling  operations  to  be  conducted 
under  water  is  merely  a  modification  of 
the  diving-bell;  but  the  application  of  it 
to  a  cylinder  forced  down  by  undermin- 
ing was  first  made,  in  1839,  at  Chalons 
for  working  a  coal  seam  rendered  inac- 
cessible by  the  infiltrations  of  the  Loire. 
After  having  begun  the  shaft  by  beating 
down  a  cylindrical  lining  of  sheet  iron, 
3|  feet  in  diameter,  it  occurred  to  the 
engineer,  M.  Triger,  to  cover  over  the 


61 

top  of  the  cylinder,  and  by  forcing  air  in 
to  drive  out  the  water  and  admit  the 
workmen.  An  air  chamber  was  formed 
at  the  top  with  double  doors,  serving  as 
a  sort  of  lock  for  the  passage  in  and  out 
of  the  cylinder  of  men  and  materials 
without  giving  an  outlet  to  the  com- 
pressed air,  and  a  pipe  running  up  the 
cylinder  carried  off  the  water  from  the 
bottom.  In  1845  M.  Triger  sank  another 
cylinder,  6  feet  in  diameter,  in  the  same 
way,  and  suggested  the  employment  of 
the  method  for  the  foundations  of 
bridges. 

The  first  bridge  foundations  of  this 
kind  were  carried  out,  in  the  years  1851- 
52,  at  the  Rochester  bridge  on  the  Med- 
way,  which  has  masonry  piers  each  sup- 
ported on  fourteen  cylinders,  6  feet  11 
inches  in  diameter,  filled  with  concrete. 
Having  begun  with  the  Potts  process  till 
on  alighting  on  old  foundations  it  proved 
useless,  Mr.  Hughes,  M.  Inst.  C.E.,  con- 
ceived the  notion  of  reversing  the  cur- 
rent of  air,  and  sinking  the  cylinders  by 
the  help  of  compressed  air.  The  success 


62 

of  this  method  recalled  to  mind  earlier 
suggestions  in  the  same  direction,  such 
as  the  patent  of  Lord  Cochrane,  in  1830, 
for  excavating  foundations  by  com- 
pressed air,  and  the  suggestion  of  M. 
Colladon  of  Geneva  to  Sir  M.  Brunei  to 
try  to  stop  the  rush  of  water  into  the 
Thames  Tunnel  by  forcing  in  air. 

At  the  Chepstow  bridge  foundations 
the  late  Mr.  I.  K.  Brunei,  Yice-President 
Inst.  C.E.,  abandoned  the  Potts  process 
on  coming  upon  an  embedded  tree,  and 
resorted  to  compressed  air,  which  he  also 
subsequently  employed  in  commencing 
the  foundations  of  the  iron  cofferdams 
used  for  the  piers  of  the  Saltash  bridge. 

The  various  details  of  the  compressed 
air  system  are  given  in  the  descriptions 
of  the  works  in  which  it  has  been  em- 
ployed. Theoretically,  when  the  lower 
edge  of  the  cylinder  has  reached  a  depth 
of  h  feet  below  the  surface  of  the  water, 
the  pressure  required  for  driving  the 

O     -I    A 

water  out  of  the  excavations  is  -V-  atmos- 

h 

pheres;   but  frequently  the  intervention 


63 

of  the  ground  between  the  bottom  of 
the  river  and  the  excavation  enables  the 
work  to  be  carried  on  at  a  less  pressure, 
as  Mr.  Brunei  did  at  Saltash.  A  con- 
siderably greater  pressure  would  be  re- 
quired if  the  water  had  to  be  forced 
from  the  excavation  through  the  soil 
below  the  river  bed;  but  this  is  avoided 
by  placing  a  pipe  inside  to  convey  away 
the  water,  and  M.  Triger  has  found  that 
the  lifting  of  the  water  was  facilitated 
by  the  introduction  of  bubbles  of  air 
into  the  pipe  at  a  certain  height. 

Pressures  of  2  or  even  up  to  3  atmos- 
pheres do  not  injure  healthy  and  sober 
men,  and  suit  best  men  of  a  lymphatic 
temperament,  but  prove  injurious  to  men 
who  are  plethoric  or  have  heart  disease. 
It  is  advisable  to  avoid  working  in  hot 
weather,  and  each  workman  should  not 
work  more  than  four  hours  per  day,  or 
more  than  six  weeks  consecutively.  At 
Harlem,  ISTew  York,  however,  workmen 
have  remained  ten  hours  under  a  pressure 
of  50  feet,  and  even  80  feet  of  water. 
On  the  other  hand,  at  St.  Louis  under  a 


64 

pressure  of  little  more  than  3  atmos- 
pheres several  men  were  paralyzed  or 
died,  and  the  period  of  work  was  gradu- 
ally reduced  from  four  hours  to  one 
hour.  From  experiments  on  animals  M. 
Bart  has  found  that  the  accidents  caused 
by  a  sudden  removal  of  pressure  are  due 
to  the  escape  of  the  excess  of  gas  ab- 
sorbed by  the  blood.  Beyond  6  atmos- 
pheres any  sudden  return  to  the  normal 
pressure  is  attended  with  danger;  the 
usual  rule  now  is  to  allow  one  minute 
per  atmosphere.  The  cylinders  subjected 
to  pressure  should  be  furnished  with 
safety  valves,  pressure  gauges,  and  alarm 
whistles,  as  explosions  occasionally  oc- 
cur. 

Iron  rings  from  6  feet  to  13  feet  in 
diameter  are  cast  in  one  piece,  and  a 
caoutchouc  washer  is  introduced  at  the 
joints  between  the  rings  ;  cylinders  of 
larger  diameter  are  cast  in  segments, 
and  cylinders  of  smaller  diameter  than  6 
feet  are  rarely  used.  The  thickness  is 
usually  1-J-  inch,  increased  to  Ij  inch  or 
1-J  inch  were  exposed  to  blows,  in  coni- 


65 

cal  joining  lengths,  and  in  the  bottom 
length. 

When  two  cylinders  have  to  be  sunk 
close  together  it  is  best  to  sink  them  al- 
ternately, as  they  tend  to  come  together 
when  sunk  at  the  same  time.  At  Macon, 
where  there  was  only  an  interval  of  3j 
feet  between  two  cylinders,  one  of  the 
cylinders  was  seen  to  rise  suddenly  as 
much  as  6  feet  when  the  other  was  forced 
down.  Sometimes  where  cylinders  of 
small  diameter  have  to  be  used  the  ex- 
cavations are  extended  beyond  the  cylin- 
der at  the  bottom,  and  filled  with  con- 
crete to  give  a  greater  bearing  surface; 
this  plan  was  adopted  at  Harlem  bridge, 
New  York,  and  by  the  late  Mr.  Cubitt, 
Vice-President  Inst.  C.E.,  at  the  Black- 
friars  railway  bridge.  Another  way  of 
accomplishing  the  same  object  is  by  en- 
larging the  lower  rings  of  the  cylinder, 
and  putting  in  a  connecting  conical 
length,  as  was  done  by  Sir  John  Hawk- 
shaw,  Past-President  Inst.  C.E.,  at  the 
Charing  Cross  and  Cannon  Street 
bridges. 


66 

The  cylinders  at  Bordeaux  were  forced 
down  by  MM.  Nepveu  and  Eiffel,  in 
1859-60,  by  strong  beams  of  wrought 
iron,  moved  up  or  down  by  the  pistons 
of  four  hydraulic  presses,  having  11  feet 
length  of  stroke  and  exerting  a  pressure 
of  60  to  70  tons;  the  force  could  be  ap- 
plied at  pleasure,  and  regulated  accord- 
ing to  circumstances.  At  Argenteuil, 
where  cylinders  12  feet  in  diameter  had 
to  be  sunk,  the  concreting  inside  was 
carried  on  during  the  sinking,  leaving 
only  a  circular  shaft  in  the  center,  3  feet 
7  inches  in  diameter,  lined  with  wooden 
framing,  and  enlarged  at  the  bottom  to 
a  conical  shape  by  a  sort  of  cage  of  in- 
clined beams  butting  against  the  bottom 
of  the  shaft  (Fig.  18).  The  cylinders 
were  sunk  50  feet  on  the  average  below 
low-water  level,  through  mud,  sand, 
gravel,  and  clay,  on  to  marl  or  limestone, 
and  four  screw-jacks  of  20  tons  power 
supported  the  bottom  ring  by  means  of 
flat,  iron  straps.  After  the  sinking  was 
completed  the  chamber  at  the  bottom 
was  filled  with  cement  concrete,  poured 


67 

around  iron  pipes  placed  near  the  sides 
so  as  to  maintain  the  pressure  of  air 
during  the  operation.  When  this  layer 
of  concrete  was  set  the  pipes  were  closed 
with  cement,  the  normal  pressure  re- 
stored, and  the  shaft  filled  up  with  con- 
crete. Concrete  deposited  under  com- 
pressed air  appears  to  set  quicker,  and  to 
increase  somewhat  in  strength,  provided 
it  is  deposited  in  thin  layers  allowing 
the  excess  of  water  to  escape.  At 
Szegedin  this  was  effected  by  mixing 
very  dry  bricks  with  the  concrete.  At 
Perpignan  the  foundations  of  a  bridge 
over  the  Tet  had  been  commenced  by 
sinking  a  masonry  cylinder  by  dredging 
inside,  but  large  stones  being  unexpect- 
edly met  with  the  method  of  compressed 
air  had  to  be  resorted  to.  The  masonry 
cylinder,  3j  feet  thick  and  13  feet  out- 
side diameter,  with  a  batter  outwards  of 
1  in  100,  was  lined  inside  with  neat 
cement,  and  was  covered  with  a  plate- 
iron  top  -J-  inch  thick.  The  sinking  was 
assisted  when  necessary  by  letting  out 
air;  the  depth  attained  was  about  26 


68 

feet.  The  cylinder  was  filled  with  con- 
crete, which  for  the  first  6£  feet  was  de- 
posited under  pressure.  The  success  at- 
tending this  experiment  has  led  M. 
Basterot  to  recommend  the  deliberate 
application  of  compressed  air  to  masonry 
cylinders  for  depths  of  less  than  33  feet 
below  water,  and  he  estimates  the  cost 
of  such  a  cylinder,  13  feet  in  diameter, 
sunk  by  this  method  26  feet  deep  and 
filled  in,  at  £340. 

The  foundations  of  the  piers  of  the 
Kehl  bridge  were  accomplished  by  the 
engineers,  MM.  Fleur  Saint-Denis  and 
Yuigner,  by  a  combination  of  the  princi- 
ples of  the  compressed  air  process,  the 
sinking  of  a  pier  by  its  own  weight,  the 
sinking  by  dredging,  and  the  cofferdam 
system.  As  the  bed  of  the  Rhine  at 
Kehl  consists  of  large  masses  of  gravel 
liable  to  be  disturbed  to  a  depth  of  55 
feet  below  low-water  level,  it  was  deem- 
ed advisable  to  carry  the  foundations 
down  about  70  feet  below  low  water. 
For  the  two  central  piers  the  chamber  of 
excavation  was  divided  into  three 


69 

caissons,  the  length  of  each  being  18 
feet  4  inches,  the  width  of  the  founda- 
tion. For  the  piers  forming  the  abut- 
ments for  the  swing  bridges  there  were 
four  caissons,  each  23  feet  long,  the 
breadth  of  all  the  caissons  being  19  feet. 
The  plate  iron  forming  the  caissons  was 
|  inch  thick  at  the  top,  and  ^  inch  thick 
at  the  sides,  and  strengthened  by  flanges 
and  gussets.  The  top  was  strengthened 
by  double  T  beams  for  supporting  the 
weight  of  the  masonry  above.  There 
were  three  shafts  to  each  caisson,  two 
being  air  shafts,  3^  feet  in  diameter,  one 
being  in  use  whilst  the  other  was  being 
lengthened  or  repaired;  the  other  shaft 
in  the  center  was  oval,  open  at  the  top 
and  dipping  into  the  water  in  the  foun- 
dations at  the  bottom,  so  that  the  water 
could  rise  in  it  to  the  level  of  the  river. 
In  this  shaft  a  vertical  dredger  with 
buckets  was  always  working,  and  the 
laborers  had  only  to  dig,  to  regulate  the 
work,  and  remove  any  obstacles.  The 
screw-jacks  controlling  the  rate  of  de- 
scent had  a  power  of  15  tons,  and  were 


70 

in  four  pairs.  The  wooden  framing 
serving  as  a  cofferdam  was  erected  above 
the  chamber  of  excavation;  it  was  use- 
ful at  the  commencement  for  getting  be- 
low the  water,  but  might  subsequently 
have  been  dispensed  with.  It  was  also 
found  by  experience  that  the  caissons 
were  sunk  better  in  one  division  than  in 
several  divisions,  and  doors  of  communi- 
cation were  accordingly  made  through 
the  double  partitions.  The  iron  linings 
to  the  air  shafts  were  removed  before 
the  shaft  was  filled  up.  The  shaft  con- 
taining the  dredger  was  at  first  made  of 
iron,  but  afterwards  of  brick  for  the  sake 
of  economy.  The  sinking  occupied 
sixty-eight  days  for  one  abutment,  and 
thirty-two  days  for  the  other,  giving  a 
daily  rate  of  1  foot  1  inch  and  1  foot  8£ 
inches  respectively.  The  sinking  of 
the  caissons  for  the  intermediate  piers 
took  twenty  to  thirty  days,  which  gives 
a  daily  rate  of  two  feet  7J  inches  (Fig. 
15). 

For  large  works,  where  the  load  on  the 
foundations     is    considerable,     carrying 


TT 


KEHL 


down  the  foundations  to  a  hard  bottom 
is  much  better  than  piling.  The  dredger 
used  at  Kehl  cannot  be  regarded  as  uni- 
versally applicable.  Some  soils  are  not 
suitable  for  dredging,  and  in  other  cases 


72 

the  small  amount  of  excavation  renders 
the  addition  of  an  extra  shaft  inexpe- 
dient, as  for  instance  at  Lorient.  The 
chamber  of  excavation  is  almost  invaria- 
bly made  of  plate  iron,  but,  unlike  those 
at  Kehl,  with  the  iron  beams  above  the 
ceiling,  instead  of  below,  so  that  the  fill- 
ing in  may  be  accomplished  more  easily. 
The  cutting  edge  is  always  strengthened 
by  additional  plates.  At  Lorient  the 
thickness  was  2^-  inches,  with  several 
plates  stepped  back  so  as  to  form  a  sort 
of  edge;  the  sides  were  about  -J  inch 
thick  at  the  bottom,  and  -^  inch  at  the 
top,  and  the  roof  was  curved  a  little  to 
increase  its  strength.  At  Vichy  the 
plates  were  about  J  inch  thick.  At  La 
Youlta,  Hollandsch  Diep,  and  Lucerne,  a 
sort  of  masonry  lining  was  placed  against 
the  iron  plates,  and  kept  in  place  by 
gusset  plates,  to  afford  greater  rigidity 
against  the  pressure  of  the  earth.  At 
St.  Maurice  wooden  struts  were  substi- 
tuted for  angle-iron  flanges;  and  at 
Yichy  struts  were  put  in  at  the  base  of 
the  caisson,  and  also  half-way  up  to  sup- 


port  the  sides.  In  consequence  of  these 
modifications,  the  caisson  at  Lucerne 
(oof  feet  by  13f  feet)  weighed  only  28 
tons;  the  caisson  at  St.  Maurice  (32f 
feet  by  14^  feet)  weighed  14  tons; 
whereas  at  Kehl,  a  caisson,  23  feet  by 
19  feet,  weighed  34  tons;  at  Lorient 
(391-  feet  by  11 J  feet)  weighed  27£  tons; 
and  at  Riga  (64^  feet  by  16  feet)  weigh- 
ed 45f  tons.  The  height  of  the  chamber 
of  excavation  should  be  about  8  feet  10 
inches.  Frequently  the  cofferdam  casing 
is  of  iron,  as  at  Kehl,  which  protects  the 
newly-built  masonry  from  friction;  and 
the  upper  portion  of  the  casing  can  be 
removed  when  the  work  is  completed. 
In  a  sea  bed,  with  a  silty  bottom,  special 
precautions  must  be  taken  against  over- 
turning, as  variations  in  weight,  accord- 
ing to  the  depth  of  immersion,  are  added 
to  the  effects  of  the  current.  Some  di- 
vergence from  the  perpendicular  at  Lo- 
rient was  due  partly  to  this  cause,  but 
partly  also  to  the  absence  of  supporting 
screw-jacks.  At  Lorient  there^were  two 
air  locks,  each  connected  with  two  shafts, 


74 

in   which  balanced  skips   went   up   and 
down  (Fig.  16).     On  the  top  of  the  bot- 


L'O'RIENT 


torn  caisson  a  casing  of  sheet  iron,  from 
T8^" to  ¥  incn  thick,  and  weighing  about 
15  tons,  was  erected  in  successive  rings. 
At  the  Nantes  bridges,  built  in  1863  by 
M.  M.  Gouin  for  the  railway  of  Roche- 
sur-Yon,  twenty-two  caissons  were  erect- 
ed, and  the  depth  of  the  concrete  foun- 


dations  varied  from  39  to  #2  feet.  The 
same  firm  were  the  contractors  for  the 
pneumatic  foundations  at  Hollandsch 
Diep  for  three  piers,  two  being  carried 
about  80  feet  below  high-water  level, 
and  the  other  65  feet.  As  the  river  bed 
was  very  soft  down  to  50  feet  below 
high  water,  and  injury  from  storms 
might  be  apprehended,  it  was  necessary 
to  perform  the  first  part  of  the  sinking 
as  rapidly  as  possible.  The  working 
chambers,  and  the  lower'  16  feet  of  the 
caisson,  and  the  shafts  for  23  feet  in 
height,  were  erected  on  the  bank,  and 
masonry  built  on  the  horizontal  projec- 
tions of  the  chambers.  Each  caisson  waa 
then  slid  down  an  inclined  plane  to  low- 
water  mark,  and  at  high  water  two  boats 
fastened  together  removed  them  to  their 
proper  site,  where  they  were  deposited 
and  gradually  sunk  into  the  ground. 
The  excavation,  the  building  up  of  the 
masonry,  and  the  addition  of  successive 
lengths  to  the  caisson,  were  carried  on 
simultaneously.  As  the  earthwork  was 
easily  removed,  the  caissons  sank  at  a 


76 

rate  of  from  1-J-  foot  to  3j  feet  per  day. 
The  first  two  piers  were  each  completed 
in  forty-five  days  from  the  launching  of 
the  caissons. 

The  Americans  have  adopted  the 
pneumatic  system  for  some  large  works, 
and  introduced  improvements.  At  the 
St.  Louis  bridge  the  foundations  were 
carried  to  a  greater  depth  than  had  ever 
been  previously  attained;  and  at  East 
River  bridge  compressed  air  was  used  in 
wooden  caissons  of  large  dimensions. 
The  particulars  of  the  St.  Louis  bridge 
have  been  given  by  Mr.  Francis  Fox,  M. 
Inst.  C.E.  The  hydraulic  sand  pumping 
tube  of  Mr.  Eads  must  only  be  recorded. 
The  following  details  of  the  East  River 
bridge  are  derived  from  the  treatise  of 
M.  Malezieux,  previously  referred  to. 
The  Brooklyn  pier  was  to  be  carried  50 
feet  and  the  New  York  pier  75  feet  be- 
low high  water.  To  provide  against  un- 
equal sinking,  owing  to  the  variable 
nature  of  the  soil,  consisting  of  stiff  clay 
mixed  with  blocks  of  trap  rock,  Mr. 
Roebling  decided  to  place  the  bottom  of 


77 


the  piers  upon  a  thick  platform  of  timber 
which  formed  the  roof  of  the  working 
chamber  (Fig.  17).  The  sides  were  also 


F'g.  17, 


BROOKLYN 

made  of  wood,  as  being  easier  than  iron 
to  launch  and  deposit  on  the  exact  site. 
The  roof  consisted  of  five  tiers  of  beams, 
1  foot  deep,  of  yellow  pine,  placed  one 
above  the  other  .and  crossed,  the  beams 
being  tightly  connected  by  long  bolts. 
The  working  chamber  was  167  feet  by 
102  feet,  and  10  feet  clear  height.  The 
side  walls  had  a  V  section,  with  a  cast- 
iron  edge  covered  with  sheet  iron;  the 
walls  had  a  batter  inside  outwards  of  1 
to  1,  and  1  in  10  on  the  outside.  Five 
transverse  wooden  partitions,  2  feet  thick 


at  the  bottom,  served  to  regulate  the 
sinking.  When  the  caisson  had  been 
put  in  place,  twelve  tiers  of  beams  were 
added  on  the  roof  of  the  chamber  of  the 
Brooklyn  pier,  and  nineteen  on  that  of 
the  New  York  pier,  so  that  the  top  rose 
above  water,  and  the  masonry  could  be 
built  without  a  cofferdam  lining.  The 
excavation,  to  the  extent  of  19,600  cubic 
yards,  was  performed  in  five  months  by 
Morris  &  Cumming's  scoop  dredger, 
working  in  two  large  shafts,  dipping  into 
the  water  at  the  bottom,  and  open 
above.  When  hard  soil  was  met  with 
these  shafts  were  shut,  and  the  excava- 
tion performed  by  manual  labor  under 
compressed  air.  In  the  New  York  cais- 
son the  total  number  of  shafts  was  nine. 
The  blocks  of  trap  rock  impeded  the 
progress  considerably;  they  had  to  be 
discovered  by  boring,  and  shifted  or 
broken  before  the  caisson  reached  them. 
When  under  26  feet  of  water  they  could 
be  blown  up;  this  enabled  the  rate  of 
progress,  which  had  been  6  inches  per 
week,  to  be  doubled  or  trebled.  When 


the  caisson  had  reached  a  compact  soil, 
it  was  possible  to  reduce  the  pressure  to 
two-thirds  of  an  atmosphere  in  excess  of 
the  normal  pressure,  and  water  had  oc- 
casionally to  be  poured  into  the  open 
shafts  to  maintain  the  proper  water-level 
in  them.  By  frequent  renewal  of  the 
air,  a  supply  was  furnished  for  one 
hundred  and  twenty  men  and  for  the 
lights;  and  the  temperature  was  kept 
nearly  constant  throughout  the  year  at 
86°  within  the  caisson,  whilst  in  the  open 
air  it  varied  from  108°  to  0°.  As  the 
load  increased  as  the  caisson  went  down, 
the  roof  of  the  Brooklyn  caisson  was 
eventually  supported  by  seventy-two 
brick  piers,  so  that  the  caisson  might 
not  become  deeply  embedded  in  the 
event  of  a  sudden  escape  of  air*  In  the 
New  York  caisson  two  longitudinal  par- 
titions were  added,  which  served  the 
same  purpose. 

.In  the  siltysand  which  was  frequently 
met  with,  a  discharge  pipe,  up  which 
the  sand  was  forced  by  compressed  air, 
proved  very  useful,  discharging  a  cubic 


80 

yard  in  about  two  minutes.  The  New 
York  caisson  (170  feet  by  102  feet)  was 
sunk  in  five  months ;  the  earthwork  re- 
moved amounted  to  26,000  cubic  yards. 
The  cheapness  of  wood  in  America  per- 
mits a  much  freer  use  of  it  there  than 
could  be  attempted  in  Europe. 

When  the  watertight  nature  of  the 
lower  soil  in  the  foundations  of  the  East 
River  bridge  is  considered,  coupled  with 
the  inconveniences  experienced  in  work- 
ing under  compressed  air,  as  shown  at 
the  St.  Louis  bridge,  it  seems  probable 
that  in  some  future  large  work  it  may  be 
possible  to  commence  sinking  a  large 
caisson  with  compressed  air,  and  after  a 
better  stratum  is  reached  open  all  the 
shafts.  The  operation  could  then  be 
completed  by  pumping  out  the  small 
amount  of  water  that  might  come  in, 
and  excavating  in  the  ordinary  way,  as 
is  often  done  in  England,  on  a  small 
scale,  where  the  excavation  to  sink  the 
cylinders  to  a  water-tight  stratum  is  per- 
formed by  divers.  If,  as  M.  Morandiere 
suggests,  the  air-lock  was  placed  close 


81 

over  the  working  chamber,  or  even  in- 
side it,  which  would  save  constant 
alterations  and  allow  of  its  being  "of 
larger  dimensions,  it  would  be  desirable 
to  have  a  special  air-lock  at  the  top,  so 
that  in  the  event  of  an  accident  the  men 
might  run  up  the  shaft  without  the  delay 
occasioned  by  passing  through  the  air- 
lock. At  Bordeaux  the  air-lock  was 
formed  by  fixing  one  circular  plate  at 
the  top  and  another  at  the  bottom  of 
one  of  the  rings  of  the  cast-iron  cylinder, 
so  that  it  was  unnecessary  to  remove  it 
each  time  that  an  additional  ring  was 
added.  To  save  loss  of  air  the  air-lock 
should  be  opened  very  seldom,  or  made 
very  small  if  required  to  be  opened 
often.  At  Argenteuil  the  air-lock  had 
an  annular  form  (Fig.  18)  with  two  com- 
partments C,  C',  each  having  an  exter- 
nal and  an  internal  door.  One  compart- 
ment was  put  in  communication  with  the 
interior  to  be  filled  with  the  excavated 
material,  whilst  the  other  was  being 
emptied  by  the  outer  door,  so  that  the 
loss  of  air  was  diminished  without  any 


ARGENTEUIL 

interruption  to  the  work.  Sometimes  a 
double  air-lock  with  one  large  and  one 
small  compartment  is  used;  the  large 
one  being  only  opened  to  let  gangs  of 
workmen  pass,  and  the  small  one  just 
big  enough  to  admit  a  skip  and  to  con- 
tain a  little  crane  for  moving  it.  By 
having  a  small  air-lock  opened  frequent- 


S3 

ly,  any  sudden  alterations  in  pressure 
are  diminished.  A  more  complete  ar- 
rangement was  adopted  at  Nantes  (Fig. 
20).  There  a  sheet-iron  cylinder  was 
placed  on  the  top  of  the  double  shaft  in 
which  the  skips  worked,  having  at  one 
side  a  crescent-shaped  chamber,  a,  serv- 
ing to  pass  four  men,  and  also  on  either 
side  two  concrete  receivers,  d,  d* ',  having 
doors  above  and  below.  There  was  also 
a  shoot  below  for  turning  the  concrete 
into  the  foundations,  and  a  box,  b,  c, 
holding  a  little  wagon  which  emerges  at 
c  after  having  been  filled  from  an  upper 
door,  b.  This  last  contrivance  resembles 
that  devised  at  Vichy  by  M.  Moreaux 
(Fig.  19).  The  cast-iron  box  L,  N,  going 


M 
VICHY 


across  a  segment  of  the  air  chamber,  has 
three  orifices,  L,  M,  N,  and  a  drawer 
with  two  compartments  slides  inside  it. 
If  these  compartments  are  at  M  and  N% 


84 

the  left  one  at  M  is  filled  whilst  the 
other  at  N  is  emptied.  Then  by  a  rack 
movement  the  drawer  is  pushed  back  till 


Fig's  20. 


NANTES 

the  compartment  to  the  right  comes  to 
the  center  of  the  box,  that  is  to  say,  into 
the  air-lock,  and  the  other  is  emptied 
outside  at  L.  At  Rotterdam,  M. 
Michaelis  put  a  little  inclined  trough  at 
the  bottom  of  the  principal  air-lock,  and 
closed  it  at  each  extremity  by  a  valve,  so 
that  it  both  formed  a  little  independent 
air-lock  and  also  a  shoot  for  the  excava- 


85 

tion.  Mr.  Smith  employed  the  same  sys- 
tem at  the  Omaha  bridge  over  the 
Missouri.  By  not  permitting  the  earth- 
work to  enter  the  principal  air-lock,  it 
was  possible  to  keep  six  great  glazed 
bull's-eyes  clean,  by  which  both  the  day- 
light was  admitted  and  at  night  the  light 
was  thrown  from  a  reflector.  The  use 
of  lamps  inside,  smoking  and  giving  a 
bad  light,  was  thus  dispensed  with. 

The  Author  next  proposes  to  give 
some  details  of  the  cost  of  foundations 
constructed  by  the  help  of  compressed 
air.  At  Moulins  cast-iron  cylinders,  8 
feet  2j  inches  in  diameter,  with  a  filling 
of  concrete  and  sunk  33  feet  below  water 
into  marl,  cost  £1'2  18s.  6d.  per  lineal 
foot,  or  £6  2s.  for  the  ironwork,  and  £6 
16s.  6d.  for  sinking  and  concrete.  At 
Argenteuil,  with  cylinders  11  feet  10 
inches  in  diameter,  the  sinking  alone  cost 
£8  13s.  2d.  per  lineal  foot,  and  one 
cylinder  was  sunk  53  J  feet  in  three  hun- 
dred and  ninety  hours;  and  at  Orival, 
£7  12s.  5d.,  where  the  cylinder  was  sunk 
49  feet  in  twenty  days.  At  Bordeaux, 


86 

with  the  same  sized  cylinders,  a  gang  of 
eight  men  conducted  the  sinking  of  one 
cylinder,  and  usually  34  cubic  yards  were 
excavated  every  twenty-four  hours.  The 
greatest  depth  reached  was  55f  feet  be- 
low the  ground,  and  71  feet  below  high 
water.  In  the  regular  course  of  work- 
ing, a  cylinder  was  sunk  in  from  nine  to 
fifteen  days,  and  the  whole  operation, 
including  preparations  and  filling  with 
concrete,  occupied  on  the  average  twenty- 
five  days.  One  cylinder,  or  a  half  pier, 
cost  on  the  average  £2,320,  of  which 
£300  was  for  sinking.  M.  Morandiere 
estimates  the  total  cost  of  a  cylinder 
sunk  like  those  at  Argenteuil,  at  a  depth 
of  50  feet,  at  £1,440. 

Considering  next  the  cost  of  piers  of 
masonry  on  wrought-iron  caissons  of  ex- 
cavation; the  foundations  of  the  Lorient 
viaduct  over  the  Scorff  cost  the  large 
sum  of  £4  19s.  per  cubic  yard,  owing  to 
difficulties  caused  by  the  tides,  the  labor 
of  removing  the  boulders  from  under- 
neath the  caisson,  and  the  large  cost  of 
plant  for  only  two  piers.  The  founda- 


87 

tions  of  the  Kehl  bridge  cost  still  more, 
about  £5  16s.  per  cubic  yard;  but  this 
cannot  be  regared  as  a  fair  instance,  be- 
ing the  first  attempt  of  the  kind. 

The  foundations  of  the  Nantes  bridges, 
sunk  56  feet  below  low- water  level,  cost 
about  £3  Is.  per  cubic  yard.  The  aver- 
age cost  per  pier  was  as  follows: 

Caisson  (41  feet  4  inches  by  14  feet  5     £ 

inches),  50  tons  of  wrought-iron  at  £24  1,200 
Cofferdam,  3  tons  of  wrought-iron  at  £12  36 
Excavation,  916  cubic  yards  at  18s.  4d. .  840 

Concrete 860 

Masonry,  plant,  &c 384 

£3,320 

One  pier  of  the  bridge  over  the  Meuse 
at  Rotterdam,  with  a  caisson  of  222  tons 
and  a  cofferdam  casing  of  94  tons,  and 
sunk  75  feet  below  high  water,  cost 
£14,550,  or  £2  17s.  5d.  per  cubic  yard. 

The  Vichy  bridge  has  five  piers  built 
on  caissons,  34  feet  by  13  feet,  and  the 
abutments  on  caissons  26  feet  by  24  feet. 
The  foundations  were  sunk  23  feet  in  the 
ground,  the  upper  portion  consisting  of 
shingle  and  conglomerated  gravel,  and 


88 

the  last  10  feet  of  marl.     The  cost  of  the 
bridge  was  as  follows: 

Interest  for  eight  months  and  deprecia-     £ 

tion  of  plant  worth  £4,000 800 

Cost  of  preparations,    approach  bridge 

and  staging 1,007 

Caissons,  No.  7,  150|  tons  at  £23  6s 3,513 

Sinking 2,017 

Concrete  and  masonry 1,089 

Contractor's  honus  and  general  expenses  1,254 

£9,680 

The  cost  per  cubic  yard  of  foundation 
below  low  water  was  £3  8s.  7d.,  of  which 
the  sinking  alone  cost  15s.  3d.  in  gravel, 
and  19s.  in  marl.  At  St.  Maurice  the 
cost  per  cubic  yard  of  foundation  was  £3 
5s.  6d.,  exclusive  of  staging. 

The  Author  has  treated  of  the  subject 
of  tubular  foundations  at  some  length, 
because  they  are  the  most  effectual 
means  at  the  disposal  of  engineers  for 
carrying  foundations  to  great  depths  be- 
low water.  Economical  considerations 
render  it  desirable  to  adopt  pumping  or 
dredging  when  possible;  but  compressed 
air  is  very  serviceable  where  boulders  or 


89 

other  obstacles  are  met  with,  or  where, 
as  at  Vichy,  the  ground  is  conglomerated 
and  unsuitable  for  dredging.  In  cases 
where  the  proper  course  to  be  adopted  is 
a  matter  of  doubt,  the  success  at  the 
Gorai  bridge,  and  the  power  of  resorting 
to  the  aid  of  divers,  if  necessary,  would 
encourage  an  attempt  being  made  to  dis- 
pense with  compressed  air,  which  at 
great  depths,  such  as  100  feet  under 
water,  is  attended  with  danger.  The 
Tet  bridge,  moreover,  furnishes  an  exam- 
ple of  the  possibility  of  resorting  at  last 
to  compressed  air  if  found  indispensa- 
ble. 

In  soft  ground  of  unknown  depth  the 
best  methods  for  making  foundations 
are  those  already  described;  but  it  is 
sometimes  advisable  in  small  works  to 
adopt  more  economical  methods.  Two 
distinct  cases  have  to  be  considered  : — 
1.  Where  the  soil  is  firm,  but  liable  to  be 
scoured  to  great  depths;  2.  Where  the 
soil  is  soft  as  well  as  exposed  to  consid- 
erable scour. 

Regemortes   gained   a    reputation  by 


90 

his  method  of  dealing  with  an  instance 
of  the  first  of  these  two  cases  at  Moulins, 
where  several  bridges  had  been  destroyed 
one  after  another  by  scour  in  floods, 
owing  to  the  piles  on  which  they  rested 
being  unable  to  penetrate  far  enough 
into  the  film  sand  composing  the  bed  of 
the  Allier. 

Regemortes,  in  1750,  renounced  the 
idea  of  finding  a  stable  foundation  far 
down,  and  built  on  the  surface,  rendering 
it  secure  from  scour  by  covering  it  with 
a  masonry  apron.  The  apron,  having  a 
uniform  thickness  of  6  feet  (Fig.  21), 

Fig.  21. 


9,10;   15.9''  62',  4. 

— * •* 

MOULINS 

was  laid  on  the  dredged  and  levelled 
bed,  dried  by  diverting  the  stream,  or,  in 
some  places,  by  inclosing  it  with  timber 
and  pumping  out  the  water.  The  infil- 
tration through  the  bottom  was  stopped 


91 

by  depositing  a  layer  of  clay  all  over, 
and  then  lowering  caulked  timber  panels 
in  it.  This  method  has,  however,  been 
much  simplified  by  the  introduction  of 
hydraulic  concrete.  The  apron  at  the 
West  Viaduct  at  Amsterdam  consists  of 
a  layer  of  concrete,  4  feet  thick,  placed 
on  piling,  and  protected  at  the  ends  by 
sheeting.  The  apron  of  the  Guetin 
canal  bridge,  constructed  by  M.  Jullien 
in  1829,  is  69  feet  wide,  5  feet  5  inches 
thick,  and  1,640  feet  long.  The  concrete 
was  carried  down  to  a  depth  of  11^  feet 
at  each  end  between  two  rows  of  sheet- 
ing 6j  feet  apart.  Another  form  of 
apron  was  adopted  at  the  Ain  bridge 
(Fig.  22),  with  a  single  row  of  sheeting 
at  each  end,  26^  feet  from  the  facing  of 
the  bridge  at  the  lower  end,  and  11 J 
feet  at  the  upper  end.  The  lower  or 
down-stream  ends  of  the  apron  were  al- 
ways the  most  secured  against  scour,  irf 
the  belief  that  a  cavity  would  be  formed 
below  by  the  scouring  away  of  the  sand, 
but  that  above  the  currents  would  bring  - 
down  sand  and  fill  up  any  hollows  that 


92 


fcafite 


93 

might  have  been  scoured  out.  The  in- 
vestigations however,  of  MM.  Minard 
and  Marchall  on  the  floods  of  the  Loire 
and  the  Allier  in  1856  indicated  that  the 
upper  end  of  the  apron  is  most  exposed 
to  scour  and  requires  most  protection,  as 
the  river  bed  close  to  the  lower  end  is 
protected  by  the  apron,  whereas  at  the 
upper  end  the  river  bed  is  exposed  to  the 
full  force  of  the  current  where  the  ob- 
structions of  the  piers  produce  whirl- 
pools. The  apron  of  the  Ain  bridge 
cost  £7  15s.  9d.  per  square  yard  of  clear 
roadway  above,  or  nearly  as  much  as  the 
bridge  which  it  supports. 

In  certain  instances  the  movable  bed 
of  a  river  has  been  sufficiently  consoli- 
dated at  the  site  of  a  work  by  merely  a 
thick  layer  of  rubble  stones  thrown  in, 
giving  time  for  the  stones  to  take  their 
final  settlement  during  floods.  Lastly,  a 
movable  bed  can  be  consolidated  by  a 
wooden  stockade  ;  one  of  these  was 
made,  in  1820,  below  Amboise  bridge, 
like  the  one  Perronet  had  put  down  un- 
der the  Orleans  bridge  in  1761,  and  both 
have  stood  perfectly. 


94 

The  second  case  of  a  soil  both  soft 
and  liable  to  scour  has  next  to  be  con- 
sidered. Where  considerations  of  ex- 
pense forbid  going  down  to  the  solid, 
the  following  methods  have  been 
adopted  : 

(1)  The  ground  is  sometimes  consoli- 
dated by  driving  a  number  of  piles  close 
together,  or  by  covering  it  with  rubble 
stones  with  or  without  fascine-work,  so 
as  to  form  a  kind  of  superficial  crust 
capable  of  bearing  the  structure.  It  is, 
however,  generally  advisable  to  break 
through  the  superficial  stratum,  and  to 
produce  a  compression  extending  down 
a  considerable  depth  by  a  large  weight 
of  earth,  as  was  done  for  the  railway 
bridge  crossing  Lake  Malar  at  Stockholm, 
where  there  is  a  thickness  of  69  feet  of 
silt  under  79  feet  of  water.  A  large 
embankment  of  sand  was  tipped  in  and 
inclosed  by  sheeting,  within  which  close 
rows  of  piles  were  driven,  and  then  a 
water-tight  caisson  was  lowered  on  a 
platform  sunk  3J  feet  below  the  water, 
in  which  the  foundations  were  com- 
menced. 


95 

(2)  Another  method  is  to  increase  the 
bearing   surface   at   the   base   by   large 
footings,  or  by  timber  platforms,  layers 
of  concrete,  bedding  courses  of  masonry, 
or  rubble  stone. 

(3)  The  weight  of  the  superstructure 
can  be  diminished   by   forming   hollow 
cells  in  the  masonry,  or  by  using  iron 
girders  instead  of  stone  arches. 

(4)  In  heterogeneous  strata  the  weight 
must  be  distributed  as  much  as  possible 
in  proportion  to  the  bearing   power  at 
different  points. 

(5)  It  is   advisable   sometimes  to  in- 
close the   site   of  the  foundations  with 
sheeting,  walls,  &c.,  not  only  as  a  pro- 
tection against  scour,  but  also  to  prevent 
the  running-in  of  the  soil  from  the  sides 
when  a  weight  is  brought  on  it. 

The  Cubsac  suspension  bridge  over  the 
Dordogne  furnishes  a  good  example  of 
a  successful  surmounting  of  difficulties 
in  foundations.  The  suspended  roadway 
was  made  as  light  as  possible;  the  piers 
were  hollow  and  perforated  cast-iron 
columns,  resting  on  a  stone  base  sup- 


96 

ported  by  piles  from  40  to  62  feet  long, 
and  2  feet  7J  inches  apart.  The  abut- 
ments and  anchorage  masonry  were  built 
with  arched  openings  and  light  inverts, 
and  the  embankments  at  each  end  were 
of  light  limestone  blocks  arranged  in 
rough  arches  so  as  to  form  hollow  spaces 
in  the  mass. 

Although  in  this  enumeration  of  the 
different  kinds  of  foundations  bridges 
have  generally  been  chosen  for  examples, 
the  methods  described  would  be  applica- 
ble to  other  works,  such  as  large  locks, 
graving  docks,  and  quay  walls. 

The  difficulties  attending  the  laying  of 
lighthouse  foundations,  and  the  means 
adopted  to  surmount  them,  are  fully  de- 
tailed in  descriptions  of  these  works. 

In  sea  works  the  chief  difficulties  are 
encountered  above  the  foundations  where 
the  sea  breaks  against  the  structure,  and 
accordingly  the  methods  of  protection 
adopted  do  not  come  within  the  limits  of 
this  Paper.  But  the  valuable  addition 
to  the  methods  of  foundations  used  for 
these  works  by  the  introduction  of  con- 


97 

crete  blocks,  which  can  be  formed  of  al- 
most any  size,  and  deposited  by  divers, 
must  not  be  overlooked. 

The  effect  of  pumping  or  hammering 
action  referred  to  by  Mr.  W.  Parkes  and 
Sir  John  Coode  (vol.  xxxvi.,  Minutes  of 
Proceedings  Inst.  O.E.,  pp.  234  and  240) 
is  due  to  the  immersion  and  emersion 
during  the  oscillation  of  waves.  Perhaps 
to  this  cause  may  be  partially  attributed 
the  fall  of  a  quay  wall  at  Yevey  in  the 
present  year.  This  wall  was  founded 
with  a  base  of  concrete  contained  in 
metallic  boxes  resting  on  high  timber 
piles. 

M.  Croizette  Desnoyers  has  framed  a 
classification  of  the  methods  of  founda- 
tions most  suitable  for  different  depths, 
and  also  an  estimate  of  the  cost  of  each. 
These  estimates,  however,  must  be  con- 
sidered merely  approximate,  as  unfore- 
seen circumstances  produce  considerable 
variations  in  works  of  this  nature. 


98 


Per  cubic  yard. 

Depths.  s.        s. 

Foundations  on  piles  J  3Q      33  f        .  ..13  to  18 


ofthe  gZPndeSS:<!n    33  to  50  feet-  -18  to  30 
'    33  to  50  feet"  '  "30  to  37 


.byjunder20feet...l2tol8 


26  to  33  j  favorable  circumstances.  18  to  55 
feet  1  unfavorable  ............  61  to  73 

[20  to  33  ft.  small 

Foundations  on  con-  J      amount  of  silt.  18  to  37 
crete  under  water  .  ]  26  to  33  ft.  large 

[     amount  of  silt.37  to  49 
Foundations  by  means  of  compressed 

air  under  favorable  circumstances  ...  55  to  67 

Foundations  by  means  f  Lorient  viaduct.  .    99 

of     compressed    air  I  Kehl  bridge  ......  122 

under     unfavorable  f  Argenteuil  bridge  140 
conditions  ..........  (.  Bordeaux  bridge.  165 

When  the  foundations  consist  of  dis- 
connected pillars  or  piles  the  above 
prices  must  be  applied  to  the  whole 
cubic  content,  including  the  intervals  be- 
tween the  parts,  but  of  course  for  an 
equal  cost  solid  piers  are  the  best. 

For  pilework  foundations  the  square 
yard  of  base  is  probably  a  better  unit 
than  the  cubic  yard.  Thus  the  founda- 
tions of  the  Vernon  bridge,  with  piles 


99 

from  24  to  31  ^eet  long,  and  with  cross 
timbering,  concrete,  and  caisson,  cost  £14 
7s.  7d.  per  square  yard  of  base.  Accord- 
ing to  estimates  made  by  M.  Picquenot, 
if  the  foundations  had  been  put  in  by 
means  of  compressed  air  the  cost  would 
have  been  £32  15s.  Yd.;  with  a  caission, 
not  watertight,  sunk  down,  £13  12s.  2d.; 
with  concrete  poured  into  a  space  inclosed 
with  sheeting,  £12  15s.  7d.;  and  by 
pumping  £17  3s.  2d.  per  square  yard  of 
base. 

M.  Desnoyers  gives  the  following 
recommendations  with  regard  to  the 
choice  of  methods: 

(1)  In  still  water  to  construct  the 
foundations  by  means  of  pumping  for 
depths  under  20  feet.  In  greater  depths 
to  construct  ordinary  works  on  piles  if 
the  ground  is  firm  or  has  been  consoli- 
dated by  loading  it  with  earth;  other- 
wise to  employ  pumping,  and  if  a  per- 
meable stratum  is  met  with  to  build  on 
it  with  a  broad  base.  For  important 
works,  if  the  soil  is  watertight,  it  is- 
advisable  to  adopt  the  method  of  pump- 


100 

ing  inside  a  framing,  carrying  down  the 
foundations  to  greater  depths  than  33 
feet  by  the  well-sinking  method.  If  the 
soil,  however,  is  permeable,  dredging 
and  concrete  deposited  under  water  must 
be  resorted  to;  compressed  air  being 
employed  for  depths  greater  than  33 
feet. 

(2)  In  mid-stream  compressed  air  mus 
be  resorted  to  for  foundations  more  than 
33  feet  below  water.  In  less  depths  the 
foundations  of  ordinary  works  are  put 
in  by  means  of  dams  or  watertight 
frames  if  the  nature  of  the  silt  admits  of 
pumping  out  the  water;  but  if  the  silt 
is  permeable  a  mass  of  concrete  is  poured 
into  the  site  inclosed  by  sheeting. 
When,  however,  an  important  work  has 
to  be  executed,  it  is  desirable  to  use 
pumps  sufficient  to  overcome  the  infiltra- 
tions. If  a  permeable  and  easily-dredged 
stratum  lies  between  the  hard  bottom 
and  the  silt  the  method  of  a  watertight 
casing,  with  a  dam  at  the  bottom,  should 
be  adopted.  To  complete  these  recom- 
mendations open  cylindrical  foundations 


101 

must  be  included.  These  may  be  re- 
sorted to,  instead  of  compressed  airr 
when  the  soil  is  readily  dredged  or 
watertight  enough  to  allow  of  pumping, 
and  also  frequently  in  the  place  of  piles 
or  the  well-sinking  method.  The  com- 
pressed air  system  is  essentially  a  last 
resource,  applicable  to  a  bed  exposed  to 
scour,  and  also  either  difficult  to  dredge 
or  with  boulders  or  other  obstacles  im- 
bedded in  it. 

In  conclusion,  a  chronological  list  of 
works  is  added  to  show  .at  what  periods 
the  principal  steps  in  advance  were 
made. 

The  system  of  rubble  mounds  is  the 
most  ancient;  and  dams  of  earth  came 
into  vogue  in  the  seventeenth  century.. 
In  1500-1507,  the  "Notre  Dame  "bridge 
at  Paris  was  founded  on  piles  surrounded 
with  heavy  rubble  stones.  In  1716  the 
Blois  bridge  was  built  on  piles  and  a 
platform  at  low-water  level.  The 
method  of  constructing  a  foundation  by 
means  of  an  apron  was  introduced  by 
Regemortes  at  Moulins  in  1750.  At 


102 

the  same  time  Labelye  built  the  founda- 
tions of  the  old  Westminster  bridge  by 
sinking  caissons  in  the  dredged  bed  of 
the  Thames,  a  similar  process  having 
been  adopted,  in  1686,  for  the  pier  of  the 
Tuileries  bridge  next  the  right  bank  of 
the  Seine.  In  1756  Des  Essarts  invented 
a  saw  for  cutting  off  piles  under  water, 
which  enabled  a  caisson  to  be  deposited 
on  piles  for  the  Saumur  bridge,  a  method 
thenceforward  adopted  for  the  bridges 
at  Paris  till  1857,  also  for  the  Sevres,  Ivry, 
and  Bordeaux  bridges,  and  old  Black- 
friars  bridge  was  built  in  the  same  way. 

In  the  year  1818  Yicat  discovered  the 
properties  of  hydraulic  mortars,  and  the 
adoption  of  a  concrete  foundation  depos- 
ited inside  sheeting  soon  followed;  also 
the  bottomless  frame  system  with  con- 
crete at  the  bottom,  first  used  by  Beau- 
demoulin  for  several  bridges  at  Paris, 
and  adopted  for  the  bridge  over  the 
Cher. 

In  1833-40  Poirel  employed  for  the 
first  time  artificial  blocks  of  concrete  at 
Algiers  harbor.  He  also  used  caissons 


FTC: 

_  _  J  p  »«» 
with  a  bottom  of 
liquid  concrete  in  situ. 

M.  Triger  first  used  compressed  air  at 
the  Chalons  coal  mine  in  1839;  and  Dr.  4 
Potts  introduced  his  system  in  1845. 

The  tubular  method  of  foundations 
was  next  introduced,  and  under  various 
forms  is  continually  becoming  more  uni- 
versally adopted.  The  following  are 
the  dates  of  some  of  the  works  for  which 
it  was  used: — 

Gravesend  cofferdam.  Mr.  J.  B.  Red- 
man  1342 

Rochester  bridge.     Mr.  Cubitt 1851 

Saltash  bridge.     Mr.  I.  K.  Brunei. . . .  1854-57 

Kehl  bridge.  Messrs.  Fleur  St.  Denis 

and  Vuigner 1853-59 

Charing  Cross  bridge.  Sir  J.  Hawk- 
shaw 1860 

Cannon  Street  bridge.  Sir  J.  Hawk- 
shaw 1863 

Victoria  bridge.     Sir  Charles  Fox 1863 

In  1867  Kennard's  sand-pump  was  used 
for  the  foundations  of  the  Jumna  bridge. 

The  "boring-head"  was  used  by  Mr. 
Leslie  in  1867-70  at  the  Gorai  bridge, 


104 

and  at  the  same  time  Mr.  Milroy  intro- 
duced his  "excavator." 

Lastly,  between  1870  and  1873  the 
Americans  laid  the  foundations  of  the 
St.  Louis  and  East  River  bridges,  whilst 
Mr.  Stoney,  by  depositing,  huge  blocks 
in  the  Liffey,  and  Mr.^Dyce  t?ay,  by  de- 
positing concrete  in  situ  in  large  masses 
at  the  Aberdeen  break-water,  extended 
the  methods  of  employing  concrete  in 
river  and  sea  works. 


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Rolls,  Measurements,  &c.  Cloth,  .  .  10  00 

GRUNER.  THE  MANUFACTURE  OF  STEEL.  By 
M.  L.  Gruner.  Translated  from  the 
French,  by  Lenox  Smith,  A.M.,  E.M. ; 
with  an  Appendix  on  the  Bessemer  Pro- 
cess in  the  United  States,  by  the  transla- 
tor. Illustrated  by  lithographed  drawings 
and  wood-cuts.  8vo,  cloth,  .  .  .  .  3  50 

BARBA.  THE  USE  OF  STEEL  IN  CONSTRUCTION. 
Methods  of  Working,  Applying,  and  Test- 
ing Plates  and  Bars.  By  J.  Barba.  Trans- 
lated from  the  French,  with  a  Preface  by 
A.L.Holley,P.B.  Illustrated.  12mo,  cloth,  1  50 

BELL.  CHEMICAL  PHENOMENA  OF  IRON 
SMELTING  An  Experimental  and  Practi- 
cal Examination  of  the  Circumstances 
which  Determine  the  Capacity  of  the  Blast 
Furnace,  the  Temperature  of  the  Air,  and 
the  Proper  Condition  of  the  Materials  to 
be  operated  upon.  By  I.  Lowthian  Bell. 
.  8vo,  cloth,  .  .  .  6  00 

6 


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WARD.  STEAM  FOR  THE  MILLION.  A  Popular 
Treatise  on  Steam  and  its  Application  to 
the  Useful  Arts,  especially  to  Navigation. 
By  J.  H.  Ward,  Commander  U.  S.  Navy. 
8vo,  cloth.  .  .  '  .  $1  00 

CLARK.  A  MANUAL  OF  RULES,  TABLES  AND 
DATA  FOR  MECHANICAL  ENGINEERS. 
Based  on  the  most  recent  investigations. 
By  Pan.  Kinnear  Clark.  Illustrated  with 
numerous  diagrams.  1012  pages.  8vo. 
Cloth,  $7  50;  half  morocco,  .  .  .  .1000 

JOYNSON.  THE  METALS  USED  IN  CONSTRUC- 
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By  F.  H.  Joynson.  Illustrated.  12mo, 
cloth, 75 

DODD.  DICTIONARY  OF  MANUFACTURES,  MIN- 
ING, MACHINERY,  AND  THE  INDUSTRIAL 
ARTS.  By  George  Dodd.  12mo,  cloth,  1  50 

VON  COTTA.  TREATISE  ON  ORE  DEPOSITS.  By 
Bernhard  Von  Cotta,  Freiburg,  Saxony. 
Translated  from  the  second  German  ed., 
by  Frederick  Prime,  Jr.,  and  revised  by 
the  author.  With  numerous  illustrations. 
8vo,  cloth,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  4  00 

PLATTNER.  MANUAL  OF  QUALITATIVE  AND 
QUANTITATIVE  ANALYSIS  WITH  THE  BLOW- 
PIPE. From  the  last  German  edition.  Re- 
vised and  enlarged.  By  Prof.  Th.  Richter, 
o  the  Royal  Saxon  Mining  Academy. 
Translated  by  Professor  H.  B.  Cornwall. 
With  eighty-seven  wood-cuts  and  lithogra- 
phic plate.  Third  edition,  revised.  668  pp. 
8vo,  cloth, 5  00 

PLYMPTON.  THE  BLOW-PIPE  :  A  Guide  to  its 
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by  George  W.  Plympton,  C.  E.,  A.  M.,  Pro- 
fessor of  Physical  Science  in  the  Polytech- 
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7 


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JANNETTAZ.     A  GUIDE  TO  THE  DETERMINATION 

OF  ROCKS  ;  being  an  Introduction  to  Lith- 
ology.  By  Edward  Jannettaz,  Docteur  des 
Sciences.  Translated  from  the  French  by 
G.  W.  Plympton,  Professor  of  Physical 
Science  at  Brooklyn  Polytechnic  Institute. 
12mo,  cloth, $1  50 

MOTT.  A  PRACTICAL  TREATISE  ON  CHEMISTRY 
(Qualitative  and  Quantitative  Analysis), 
Stoichionietry,  Blowpipe  Analysis,  Min- 
eralogy, Assaying,  Pharmaceutical  Prepa- 
rations Human  Secretions,  Specific  Gravi- 
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By  Henry  A.  Mott,  Jr.,  E.  M.,  Ph.  D.  650  pp. 
8vo,  cloth '600 

PYNCHON.  INTRODUCTION  TO  CHEMICAL  PHY- 
SICS ;  Designed  for  the  Use  of  Academies, 
Colleges,  and  High  Schools.  Illustrated 
with  numerous  engravings,  and  containing 
copious  experiments,  with  directions  for 
preparing  them.  By  Thomas  Ruggles  Pyn- 
chon,  D.  D.,  M.  A.,  President  of  Trinity  Col- 
lege, Hartford.  New  edition,  revised  and 
enlarged.  Crown  8vo,  cloth,  .  .  .  3  00 

PRESCOTT.  CHEMICAL  EXAMINATION  OF  ALCO- 
HOLIC LIQUORS.  A  Manual  of  the  Constit- 
uents of  the  Distilled  Spirits  and  Ferment- 
ed Liquors  of  Commerce,  and  their  Quali- 
tative and  Quantitative  Determinations. 
By  Alb.  B.  Prescott,  Prof,  of  Chemistry, 
University  of  Michigan.  12mo,  cloth,  .  1  50 

ELIOT  AND  STORER.  A  COMPENDIOUS  MANUAL 
OF  QUALITATIVE  CHEMICAL  ANALYSIS.  By 
Charles  W.  Eliot  and  Frank  H.  Storer.  Re- 
vised, with  the  co-operation  of  the  Authors, 
by  William  Ripley  Nichols,  Professor  of 
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of  Technology.  New  edition,  revised.  Il- 
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NAQUET.  LEGAL  CHEMISTRY.  A  Guide  to  the 
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ings, Adulteration  of  Alimentary  and  Phar- 
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and  Examination  of  Hair,  Coins,  Fire-arms 
and  Stains,  as  Applied  to  Chemical  Juris- 
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sicians, Lawyers,  Pharmacists,  and  Ex- 
perts. Translated,  with  additions,  includ- 
ing a  List  of  Books  and  Memoirs  on  Toxi- 
cology, etc.,  from  the  French  of  A.  Naquet, 
by  J.  P.  Battershall,  Ph.  D. ;  with  a  Preface 
by  C.  F.  Chandler,  PI*.  D.,  M.  D.,  LL.  D. 
Illustrated.  12mo,  cloth,  .  .  .  .  $2  00 

PRESCOTT.  OUTLINES  OF  PROXIMATE  ORGANIC 
ANALYSIS  for  the  Identification,  Separa- 
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the  more  commonly  occurring  Organic 
Compounds.  By  Albert  B.  Prescott,  Pro- 
fessor of  Chemistry,  University  of  Michi- 
gan. 12mo,  cloth,  .  .  .  .17") 

DOUGLAS  AND  PRESCOTT.  QUALITATIVE  CHEM- 
ICAL ANALYSIS.  A  Guide  in  the  Practical 
Study  of  Chemistry,  and  in  the  work  of 
Analysis.  By  S.  H.  Douglas  and  A.  B. 
Prescott ;  Professors  in  the  University  of 
Michigan.  Second  edition,  revised.  8vo, 
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RAMMELSBERG.  GUIDE  TO  A.  COURSE  OF 
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CIALLY OF  MINERALS  AND  FURNACE  PRO- 
DUCTS. Illustrated  by  Examples.  By  C. 
F.  Rammelsberg.  Translated  by  J.  Tow- 
ler,  M.  D.  8vo,  cloth, 2  25 

BEILSTEIN.  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  QUALITATIVE 
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I2mo.  cloth, 75 

POPE.  A  Hand-book  for  Electricians  and  Oper- 
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Revised  and  enlarged,  and  fully  illustrat- 
ed. 8vo,  cloth 2  00 

9 


D.  VAN  NOSTRAND'S  PUBLICATIONS. 

SABINE.  HISTORY  AND  PROGRESS  OF  THE  ELEC- 
TRIC TELEGRAPH,  with  Descriptions  of 
some  of  the  Apparatus.  By  Robert  Sabine, 
C.  E.  Second  edition.  I2mo,  cloth,  .  .  $1  25 

DAVIS  AND  RAE.  HAND  BOOK  OF  ELECTRICAL 
DIAGRAMS  AND  CONNECTIONS.  By  Charles 
H.  Davis  and  Frank  B.  Rae.  Illustrated 
\yith  32  full-page  illustrations.  Second  edi- 
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HASKINS.  THE  GALVANOMETER,  AND  ITS  USES. 
A  Manual  for  Electricians  and  Students. 
By  C.  H.  Haskins.  Illustrated.  Pocket 
form,  morocco, 150 

LARRABEE.  CIPHER  AND  SECRET  LETTER  AND 
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ments. By  C.  S.  Larrabee.  18mo,  flexi- 
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G1LLMORE  PRACTICAL  TREATISE  ON  LIMES, 
HYDRAULIC  CEMENT,  AND  MORTARS.  By 
Q.  A.  Gillmore,  Lt.-Col.  U.  S.  Engineers, 
Brevet  Major-General  U.  S.  Army.  Fifth 
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GILLMORE.  COIGNET  BETON  AND  OTHER  ARTIFI- 
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S.  Army.  Nine  plates,  views,  etc.  8vo, 
cloth,  2  50 

GILLMORE.  A  PRACTICAL  TREATISE  ON  THE 
CONSTRUCTION  OF  ROADS,  STREETS,  AND 
PAVEMENTS,.  By  Q.  A.  Gillmore,  Lt.-Col. 
U.  8.  Engineers,  Brevet  Major-General  U. 
S.  Army.  Seventy  illustrations.  12mo,  do.,  2  00 

GILLMORE.  REPORT  ON  STRENGTH  OF  THE  BUILD- 
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HOLLEY.  AMERICAN  AND  EUROPEAN  RAILWAY 
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D.  VAN  NOSTRAND'S  PUBLICATIONS. 

HAMILTON.  USEFUL  INFORMATION  FOR  RAIL- 
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Engineer.  Seventh  edition,  revised  and  en- 
larged. 577  pages.  Pocket  form,  morocco, 
gilt, ,  .  $2  00 

STUART.  THE  CIVIL  AND  MILITARY  ENGINEERS 
OF  AMERICA.  By  General  Charles  B. 
Stuart,  Author  of  "Naval  Dry  Docks  of 
the  United  States,"  etc.,  etc.  With  nine 
finely-executed  Portraits  on  steel,  of  emi- 
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ca. 8vo,  cloth, 5  00 

ERNST.  A  MANUAL  OF  PRACTICAL  MILITARY 
ENGINEERING.  Prepared  for  the  use  of  the 
Cadets  of  the  U.  S.  Military  Academy, 
and  for  Engineer  Troops.  By  Capt.  O.  H. 
Ernst,  Corps  of  Engineers,  Instructor  in 
Practical  Military  Engineering,  U.  S. 
Military  Academy.  193  wood-cuts  and  3 
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SIMMS.  A  TREATISE  ON  THE  PRINCIPLES  AND 
PRACTICE  OF  LEVELLING,  showing  its  ap- 
plication to  purposes  of  Railway  Engineer- 
ing and  the  Construction  of  Roads,  etc. 
By  Frederick  W.  Simms,  C.  E.  From  the 
fifth  London  edition,  revised  and  correct- 
ed, with  the  addition  of  Mr.  Law's  Prac- 
tical Examples  for  Setting-out  Railway 
Curves.  Illustrated  with  three  lithograph- 
ic plates,  and  numerous  wood-cuts.  8vo, 
cloth, -  2  50 

JEFFERS.  NAUTICAL  SURVEYING.  By  William 
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ed with  9  copperplates,  and  31  wood-cut 
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THE  PLANE  TABLE.  ITS  USES  IN  TOPOGRAPHI- 
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D.  VAN  NOSTRAND'S  PUBLICATIONS. 

A  TEXT-BOOK  ON  SURVEYING,  PROJECTIONS, 
AND  PORTABLE  INSTRUMENTS,  for  the  use 
of  the  Cadet  Midshipmen,  at  the  U.  S. 
Naval  Academy.  9  lithographed  plates, 
and  several  wood-cuts.  8vo,  cloth,  .  .  $2  00 

CHAUVENET.  NEW  METHOD  OF  CORRECTING 
LUNAR  DISTANCES.  By  Win.  Chauvenet, 
LL.D.  8vo,  cloth 2  00 

BURT.  KEY  TO  THE  SOLAR  COMPASS,  and  Sur- 
veyor's Companion;  comprising  all  the 
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HOWARD.   EARTHWORK  MENSURATION  ON  THE 

BASIS    OF     THE      PRISMOlDAL     FORMULAE. 

Containing  simple  and  labor-saving  meth- 
od of  obtaining  Prisuioidal  Contents  direct- 
ly from  End  Areas.    Illustrated  by  Exam- 
ples, and  accompanied  by  Plain  Rules  for 
gractical  uses.    By  Con  way  R.   Howard, 
ivil   Engineer,  Richmond,  Va.   Illustrat- 
ed.   SVQ,  cloth, 1  50 

MORRIS.  EASY  RULES  FOR  THE  MEASUREMENT 
OF  EARTHWORKS,  by  means  of  the  Pr-is- 
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Civil  Engineer.  78  illustrations.  8vo,  cloth,  1  50 

CLEVENGER.  A  TREATISE  ON  THE  METHOD  OF 
GOVERNMENT  SURVEYING,  as  prescribed 
by  the  U.  S.  Congress  and  Commissioner  of 
the  General  Land  Office.  With  complete 
Mathematical,  Astronomical,  and  Practi- 
cal Instructions  for  the  use  of  the  U.  S. 
Surveyors  in  the  Field.  By  S.  V.  Cleven- 
ger,  U.  S.  Deputy  Surveyor.  Illustrated. 
Pocket  form,  morocco,  gilt,  .  .  .  2  50 

HEWSON.  PRINCIPLES  AND  PRACTICE  OF  EM- 
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cloth, 2  00 

12 


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MINIFIE.  A  TEXT-BOOK  OF  GEOMETRICAL 
DRAWING,  for  the  use  of  Mechanics  and 
Schools.  With  Illustrations  for  Drawing 
Plans,  Elevations  of  Buildings  and  Ma- 
chinery. With  over  200  diagrams  OH  steel. 
By  William  Minitie,  Architect  Ninth  edi- 
tion. Royal  8vo,  cloth $4  00 

MINIFIE  GEOMETRICAL  DRAWING.  Abridged 
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New  edition,  enlarged.  I2mo,  cloth,  2  00 

FREE  HAND  DRAWING.  A  GUIDE  TO  ORNAMEN- 
TAL, Figure,  and  Landscape  Drawing.  By 
an  Art  Student.  Profusely  illustrated. 
18ino,  boards,  .  .  50 

AXON.  THE  MECHANIC'S  FRIEND.  A  Collec- 
tion of  Receipts  an.  i  I'rar  i  n-cii  tiu^gesiioiis, 
relating  to  Aquaria— Bronzing— Cements 
—Drawing — Dyes— Elect  ricity— Gilding — 
Glass-working  — Glues  —  Horology—  Lac- 
quers—Locomotives —Magnetism  —  Metal- 
working—  Modelling  —  Photography— Py- 
rotechny— Railways— Solders— Steam  -  En- 
gine—Telegraphy— Taxidermy— Varnishes 
— Waterprooflng-and  Miscellaneous  Tools, 
Instruments,  Machines,  and  Processes 
connected  with  the  Chemical  and  Mechan- 
ical Arts.  By  William  E.  Axou,  M.R.S.L. 
121110,  cloth.  300  illustrations,  .  .  .  1  50 

HARRISON.  MECHANICS'  TOOL  BOOK,  with 
Practical  Rules  and  Suggestions,  for  the 
use  of  Machinists,  Iron  Workers,  and  oth- 
ers. By  W.  B.  Harrison.  44  illustrations. 
12mo,  cloth 1  50 

JOYNSON.  THE  MECHANIC'S  AND  STUDENT'S 
GUIDE  in  the  designing  and  Construction 
of  General  Machine  Gearing.  Edited  by 
Francis  H.  Joynson.  With  18  folded 
plates.  8vo,  cloth  .  .  .  2  00 

13 


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RANDALL.  QUARTZ  OPERATOR'S  HAND-BOOK. 
By  P.  M.  Randall.  New  Edition.  Revised 
and  Enlarged.  Fully  illustrated.  12mo, 
cloth, .  .  $2  00 

SILVERSMITH.  A  PRACTICAL  HAND-BOOK  FOR 
MINERS,  METALLURGISTS,  and  Assayers. 
By  Julius  Silversmith.  Fourth  Edition. 
Illustrated.  12mo,  cloth,  .  .  .3  00 

BARNES.  SUBMARINE  WARFARE,  DEFENSIVE 
AND  OFFENSIVE.  Descriptions  of  the  va- 
rious forms  of  Torpedoes,  Submarine  Bat- 
teries and  Torpedo  Boats  actually  used  in 
War.  Methods  of  Ignition  by  Machinery, 
Contact  Fuzes,  and  Electricity,  and  a  full 
account  of  experiments  made  to  deter- 
mine the  Explosive  Force  of  Gunpowder 
under  Water.  Also  a  discussion  of  the  Of- 
fensive Torpedo  system;  its  effect  upon 
Iron-clad  Ship  systems,  and  influence  upon 
future  Naval  Wars.  By  Lieut.-Com.  John 
S.  Barnes,  U.  S.  N.  With  20  lithographic 
plates  and  many  wood-cuts.  8vo,  cloth,  5  OO 

FOSTER.  SUBMARINE  BLASTING,  in  Boston 
Harbor,  Mass.  Removal  of  Tower 
and  Corwin  Rocks.  By  John  G.  Foster, 
U.  S.  Eng.  and  Bvt.  Major  General  U.  S. 
Army.  With  seven  Plates.  4to,  cloth,  3  50 

MOWBRAY.  TRI-NITRO-GLYCERINE,  as  ap- 
plied in  the  Hoosac  Tunnel,  and  to  Sub- 
marine Blasting,  Torpedoes,  Quarrying, 
etc.  Illustrated.  8vo,  cloth,  ...  3  00 

WILLIAMSON.  ON  THE  USE  OF  THE  BAROME- 
TER ON  SURVEYS  AND  RECONNAISSANCES. 
Part  I.-Meteorology  in  its  Connection  with 
Hypsomerry.  Part  II.— Barometric  Hyp- 
sometry.  By  R.  S.  Williamson,  Bvt.  Lt.- 
Col.  U.S.A.,  Major  Corps  of  Engineers. 
With  illustrative  tables  and  engravings. 
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WILLIAMSON.  PRACTICAL  TABLES  IN  METE 
UROLOGY  AND  HYPSOMETRY,  in  connection 
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8.  Williamson,  U.  8.  A.  4to,  flexible  cloth,  $2  50 

BUTLER.  PROJECTILES  AND  RIFLED  CANNON 
A  Critical  Discussion  of  the  Principal  Sys 
tenis  of  Rifling  and  Projectiles,  with  Prac- 
tical Suggestions  for  their  Improvement. 
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U.  S.  A.  36  Plates.  4to,  cloth,  .  7  50 

BENET  ELECTRO  BALLISTIC  MACHINES,  and 
the  Schultz  Chronoscope.  By  Lt.-Col  S. 
V  Benet,  Chief  of  Ordnance  U.  S.  A. 
Second  edition,  illustrated.  4to,  cloth,  .  3  (X) 

MICHAELIS  THE  LE  BOULENGE  CHRONO- 
GRAPH. With  three  lithographed  folding 
plates  of  illustrations.  By  Bvt.  Captian 
O.  E.  Michaelis,  Oriluance  Corpse,  U.  S.  A. 
4to,  cloth, 3  GO 

NUGENT.  TTEATISE  ON  OPTICS;  or  Light  and 
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industrial  Pursuits.  By  E.  Nugent.  With 
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PEIRCE.  SYSTEM  OF  ANALYTIC  MECHANICS.  By 
Benjamin  Peirce,  Professor  of  Astronomy 
and  Mathematics  in  Harvard  University. 
4to-  cloth,  10  00 

CRAIG  WEIGHTS  AND  MEASURES.  An  Account 
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version for  Commercial  and  Scientific 
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limpclotn,  .......  50 

ALEXANDER.  UNIVERSAL  DICTIONARY  OF 
WEIGHTS  AND  MEASURES,  Ancient  and 
Modern,  reduced  to  the  standards  of  the 
United  States  of  America.  By  J  H.  Alex- 
ander. New  edition.  8vo,  cloth,  .  3  50 
15 


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ELLIOT.  EUROPEAN  LIGHT-HOUSE  SYSTEMS. 
Being  a  Report  of  a  Tour  of  Inspection 
made  in  1873.  By  Major  George  H.  Elliot, 
U.  8.  Engineers.  51  engravings  and  21 
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SWEET.  SPECIAL  REPORT  ON  COAL.  ByS.  H. 

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COLBURN.    GAS  WORKS  OF  LONDON.  By  Zerah 

Colburn.    12mo,  boards,          ....         60 

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POOR.  METHOD  OF  PREPARING  THE  LINES  AND 
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SAELTZER.  TREATISE  ON  ACOUSTICS  in  connec- 
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EASLIE  A  HAND-BOOK  FOR  THE  USE  OF  CON- 
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T.—  ON  THV,  PHY^IOAL  BASIS  OF  LIFE.  By 
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TIL—AS  REGARDS  PROTOPLASM,  in  relation 
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NO.  VI.--NATUKAL  ^ELECTION  AS  APPLIED 
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